2015, Columbia Engineering

A leader in the field of water resources and urban sustainability, you have emerged as one of the School’s most accomplished, versatile, and popular professors, integrating teaching and research to create new possibilities in innovation and design. You received a B.S. with Honors in civil engineering in 1982 from the University of Leeds. After a brief stint working at C.H. Dobbie & Partners, a civil engineering firm, you earned your M.Phil. (1985) and Ph.D. (1989) from Cambridge University. You held research fellowships at City University, London and the University of Western Australia and taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology before joining Columbia’s Department of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics in 2003.

Your research group investigates opportunities for green infrastructure, social networks and advanced measurement, and develops sensing technologies to improve urban water, energy, and environmental management. You have been a pioneer and champion for interdisciplinary study and academic service-learning. In your courses, New York City and other locations become living laboratories where both researchers and students learn by completing real projects. In Engineering for Developing Communities, an interdisciplinary course that is open to all engineering undergraduates, your students work in teams on projects for local clients. They design sustainable solutions that factor in social, economic, and governance issues, and that can be implemented now or in the near future.

You co-teach The Urban Ecology Studio with Professor of Architecture Richard Plunz (with whom you co-direct the Earth Institute’s Urban Design Lab), enabling an integrated group of architecture and engineering students to develop solutions to the challenges of modern cities. In this innovative collaboration, the students work on urban projects not only in New York City but also in locations such as Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic.

As principle investigator for the National Science Foundation supported Columbia Green Roof Consortium, you converted buildings on the Morningside Campus into test beds for green roof technologies and engaged local high-school students as well as Columbia undergraduates and graduate students in evaluating them for use throughout New York City. You were a driving force behind the creation of the University’s new Data Science Institute, and as the Institute’s associate director, you have led its academic program, which already offers certificate and master’s degree programs and will soon offer both undergraduate and doctoral degrees in data science.

You have been vice dean of academic affairs for the School, helped design its undergraduate minor in sustainable development, and served on the Earth Institute’s Education Committee. You are the author or co-author of six books, five book chapters, 100 referred scientific publications, and 40 other major publications. Your many awards include a NSF CAREER Award, the Egerton Career Development Chair and Arthur C. Smith Award for contributions to undergraduate life at MIT, the Columbia Engineering Alumni Association's Distinguished Faculty Award, and Columbia University's Presidential Teaching Award.

In recognition of passionate and innovative engagement with your students, the Society of Columbia Graduates is honored to present you with its 2015 Great Teacher Award.