UTA’s Kermanshachi selected as 2019 Rising Star in civil engineering

Sharareh (Sherri) Kermanshachi has been selected as a 2019 Rising Stars in Civil + Structural Engineering.

Kermanshachi is an assistant professor of civil engineering and director of the Resilient Infrastructure and Sustainable Environment, or RISE, lab at The University of Texas at Arlington.

The Rising Stars in Civil + Structural Engineering list recognizes 20 professionals, ages 40 or younger and working in the United States, who have shown exceptional technical capability, leadership ability, teaching, research and public service.

Ali Abolmaali, chair of the Department of Civil Engineering, said UTA benefits from Kermanshachi’s expertise.

“She has contributed so much to the construction/infrastructure field and industry at this early part of her career,” Abolmaali said. “Her work touches students, colleagues and the industry. Her projects have significant and valuable impacts on society and communities at the national, state and local levels. Plus, the solutions she develops offer help in solving important problems and challenges in the civil engineering world.”

Kermanshachi recently won the 2018 Design-Build Institute of America Distinguished Leadership Award in the faculty category. She was the only faculty recipient of the award for 2018.

Kermanshachi was also the only academic recipient of the 2017 Texas and Louisiana Engineering News Record Top 20 Under 40 Award and was invited to serve as the judge for the 2017 and 2018 ENR Best Projects.

In addition to supervising multiple doctoral and master’s students, Kermanshachi is the founder of UTA’s Design-Build Institute of America student chapter and currently serves as its faculty adviser.

She has conducted several national- and state-level research projects that were awarded by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine; Texas Department of Transportation; U.S. Department of Transportation; Transportation Cooperative Research Program; National Cooperative Highway Research Program; Louisiana Department of Transportation; Construction Industry Institute; city of Arlington; Engineering Information Foundation and city of Fort Worth.

She has published more than 80 books, journal articles, conference papers and research reports and served as a panel member on multiple research projects funded by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine and the U.S. Department of Transportation.

Kermanshachi also has received several other prestigious national and regional awards including the American Society of Civil Engineers, or ASCE, Professional Service Award; ASCE Excellence in Civil Engineering Education Fellowship; Utility Engineering & Surveying Institute Fellowship; ASCE Outstanding Reviewer; Albert Nelson Marquis Lifetime Achievement Award; Open Educational Resources Research Fellowship; DBIA Owner Scholarship and the Graduate Climate Award.

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