CEN professor appointed Fellow of American Society of Civil Engineering

Dr. Jamal Abdalla, Professor of Civil Engineering at the College of Engineering (CEN) at American University of Sharjah (AUS), has been named a Fellow by the American Society of Civil Engineering (ASCE) Board of Direction recently.

The new title comes in recognition of Dr. Abdalla’s achievements in civil engineering. It recognizes his track record of awards, publications and presentations, long meritorious service to ASCE and other professional societies, as well as other civic involvement including charitable, community, volunteering, and other work.

“As a Fellow I will continue serving ASCE, the community, mentoring students and inspiring other colleagues and members to climb the ASCE membership ladder and get promoted to the next membership levels,” said Dr. Abdalla.

He added: “I am a structural engineer by education and practice, and a registered Professional Engineer (P.E.) in the State of Virginia, USA. The Structural Engineering Institute (SEI) is one of the major institutes of ASCE. I have already started the formation of an SEI Chapter (Local Group-UAE and SEI Graduate Student Chapter) here. Based on my proposal, and with the support of the SEI Headquarters, the ASCE-UAE Section Board has approved the formation of the chapter. The objectives of the SEI Chapter in UAE are to promote SEI goals to connect with colleagues and graduate students, take advantage of local opportunities for lifelong learning, and advance structural engineering in the UAE.”

Dr. Abdalla also encourages civil engineering students to get involved with ASCE at an early stage as student members and become active in the society. “This is very important for their profession as future civil engineers. There are a lot of benefits to becoming a member and it is advantageous to start early in order to serve society and the community and progress to other membership levels in due time,” he said.

Prior to his current position, Dr. Abdalla taught at Qatar University and at the University of Khartoum in Sudan. His research interests cover computing in civil engineering, seismic hazard assessment, earthquake engineering and strengthening/retrofitting of structures. He is also the author of more than 185 publications, including refereed journal articles, conference proceedings and technical reports.

Dr. Abdalla served as an associate editor of the ASCE Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering, guest editor of the Journal of The Franklin Institute and is currently on the editorial board of the International Journal of Computers and Concrete. He has also received ASCE’s Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering’s Best Paper Award and the Arab Fund’s Distinguished Scholar Fellowship Award.

A member of the Board of Directors of the International Society for Computing in Civil and Building Engineering (ISCCBE) since 2002, Dr. Abdalla is one of the pioneers in data modeling in structural engineering, and spent a sabbatical leave at Stanford University working on building data and information modeling.

He has served as the head of the Department of Civil Engineering department for nine years and has led the department through its first and second ABET accreditation. As director of the graduate programs, he has led the accreditation and licensing of five master of science programs within the college of engineering at the university.