Happy July East Central Branch,

 

My message this month is one of congratulations. First congrats to everyone for making it half way through 2020! I think we can all agree that it has been one crazy ride and I'm really hoping the remainder of the year goes a little more smoothly. I mean, what more can the world throw at us? *knock on wood*

 

Student Outstanding Service Award	Hannah Waddell
Student of the Year Award	Christopher Carrino
Graduate Student of the Year	Khanh Olka
Kathy J. Caldwell Student Chapter of the Year	University of Central Florida
Engineer of the Year	Frank Caruso, PE, Life M. ASCE
Project of the Year	NeoCity Academy Owner - School District of Osceola County Architect - LITTLE Civil Engineer - Hanson Walter & Associates, Inc.
Branch of the Year	East Central Branch	Activity Summary

Third, the ASCE Florida Section, in partnership with the Florida Engineering Foundation, has been conducting a student bridge designer competition for the past 10 years. Originally called the West Point Bridge Design Contest, then later Engineering Encounters, the ASCE Florida Section has now rebranded the competition the ASCE Bridge Florida Contest.

Way to shine everyone! Keep up the hard work!

If you have been considering joining the ASCE East Central Board, now is your chance!  We are accepting applications for the Secretary position now through the end of this month. Please reach out to our Nominations & Tellers Committee Lead, Steve Sommerfeldt, ssommerfeldt@inwoodinc.com.

Dr. Phillips House

By Rocio Rodriguez

History & Heritage Committee Chair

  

The Dr. Phillips House located in Downtown Orlando at 135 N Lucerne Cir E. was built in 1893 by Col. Peleg Peckham for his daughter as a wedding gift. The house was originally part of a neighborhood of single-family residences which overlooked Lake Lucerne. The lot included a garage and a dance hall on the rear of the property, and ornamental gardens closer to the house. The north end of the original lot has been lost to the construction of an elevated expressway.

Figure 1: A 1907 postcard shows the drive around Lake Lucerne in Orlando with Dr. Phillips house on the far right [1].

In 1912, Dr. Phillips and wife Della purchased the Peleg Peckham house (as it is also known) and remodeled it, adding the Greek revival portico, a cellar, additional bedrooms, and converting gaslights to electricity. The Phillips used their home and gardens for promoting the arts and for the entertainment of friends.

 

This is the only example of a 19th century Shingle style mansion in Orlando. It features horizontal bands of shingles in various shapes to differentiate the floors, and the diamond patterned shingles on the roof of the small tower at the east corner of the building.

The interior of the house retains its original configuration except for the addition of several bathrooms in the early 20th century.

Even though Dr. Phillips died in 1959, the mansion remained in the family until 1974. On July 15, 1974 his son Howard Phillips donated the property to the City of Orlando. Figure 2 shows the way the mansion looked in 1978, and how it looks nowadays.

Figure 2: South façade. Appearance of the house in 1978 [2] (left) and nowadays (right).

Figure 3: Reception rooms downstairs and guest rooms

Figure 4: Third floor suites

The mansion was added to the National Register of Historic places in 1979.

References:

[1]  https://www.orlandosentinel.com/features/os - joy - wallace - dickinson - 0729 - story.html

[2]  https://npgallery.nps.gov/NRHP/GetAsset/230a757c - aa1f - 440b - 8f1b - 3b714ee94e86/

[3] https://www.orlando.gov/Our - Government/History/Find - Historic - Landmarks/Peleg - PeckhamDr.-P.-Phillips-House/Peleg-PeckhamDr.-P.-Phillips-House

On June 18th, ASCE EWRI held its inaugural technical webinar on the CRISPS Project, presented by Rob Mattson, CEP, CSE, (SJRWMD). With over 55 attendees and no technical glitches, the event was a great success that incited many technical follow-up questions. A big thanks to our Seminar Sponsors who made this webinar possible free of charge to our membership. Thank you - Protean Design Group, DRMP, GEC, The Balmoral Group, Florida Engineering Group, Singhofen & Associates, WGI, and TLP.

 

Your EWRI committee is looking forward to bringing future webinars to our membership with the following events already scheduled:

 

Education Committee was able to host Engineering Encounters this year which is now known as the ASCE Bridge competition.  As well we had one individual place in the Florida Section Competition.

 

The winners for the branch and section competition was as follows  

 

For the Elementary Division  

 

For the Junior Division we had Jaden Valentine be first in the branch competition and fourth place at ASCE Florida Section competition.   

 

And finally for the Senior Division Lance Harmon was 1st in the branch competition and placed third in the Florida Section Competition, and Emma Estaben place Second in the branch competition. 

 

We hope more students will compete and we received feed back that all students found the competition to be fun and were happy to learn about the different aspects of bridge design.

Mentor - Mentee Spotlight

The purpose of this section is to shine a "spotlight" to our active Mentorship program. Read below on how both a Mentor & Mentee program with the ASCE is making a difference!

 

Here's a sneak peak during their Mentor & Mentee Zoom Calls! 

 

Our typical Mentor & Mentee activities includes:

Mentor - Truong A. Trinh, PE  

Truong is operations manager for Scalar Consulting Group with more than 21 years of experience in transportation design and project management. He is a proud UCF Graduate (Go knights and charge on!), Ex-ASCE ECB officer (Engineering Management Group, Scholarship Committee, etc.), and a proud father to two wonderful children's!    

 

" As a young engineer planning to graduate in 1998, I was fortunate to have a few mentors from GPA, Inc. where I worked as a Student Intern at the time. They shared me their knowledge and insights about the industry. Civil Engineering is an exciting career, which is often complex, scary but yet, enjoyable and satisfying.  Their mentorship has helped me preparing myself for the future and who I am today. I cannot thank them enough. This has also inspired me to give back to the community and be a mentor to the next generation. I have found a connection with students when I share my own life trajectory as a student, an engineer, and a Project Manager. Stories of what to look for from the bumps and turns along the way. When you piece together life's uncertainties with strategies to success, you offer students a plan to the future.  No one plans to fail; they just failed to plan. I find it enjoyable knowing that a student can be a prospect for potential greatness and that he or she may be our next leader that will guide us for many years to come. "

 

Mentee - Megan Engle

Why did you sign up for the ASCE Mentorship program?

"My name is Megan Engle and I am a Civil Engineering Major at the University of Central Florida. I signed up for the ASCE Mentorship Program during my senior year of undergraduate studies to learn more about the possible career paths after college. My mentor, Truong Trinh, was able to answer all my questions and more. He gave me insight on the different aspects of working as a Project Manager and tips on how to get the most knowledge and experience from a job. He also helped me improve my resume and talking points when applying and interviewing for a position. Since starting the mentorship, I have been accepted into the Structural Engineering Master's Program at UCF and have more confidence in my future endeavors." 

ASCE ECB & YMF Virtual 5k Challenge!!

The East Central Branch and Younger Members Forum want to thank you for participating in our virtual 5k!

 

All proceeds for this event will be entirely donated to United Against Poverty. Founded in 2003, this organization provides food, housing assistance, and other essentials to local families in need. Their purpose is to support and empower low income families so that they have an opportunity to gain economic self-sufficiency. 

 

Congratulations to Sam Bower for placing first in the men's category! He was able to fly through the 5k in 27 minutes and 40 seconds.  

ASCE YMF Luncheon - Leadership Outside your Daily Job

 

Join our Brown-bag luncheon series as we dive into the stories of some of the most successful engineers in our community. On this live-interview session with Maria Lehman, we will unravel and answer some of the most frequently asked questions in the world of engineering.

 

Register now

How satisfied are you with the ASCE YMF?

(events, luncheons, PE Review, charity events, etc)

We strife in providing a great community for other engineer to learn and grow in their career, we want your feedback about everything. Please fill the following 2-minute survey so that we can help you better!

 

ASCE-UCF would first like to start out with congratulating Chris Carrino for being awarded Student of the Year, Hannah Waddell for being awarded Student Outstanding Service, Khanh Olka for being awarded Graduate Student of the Year, and the UCF ASCE Chapter for winning Chapter of the year. This wouldn't have been possible without the East Central Branch and all of our amazing members. 

 

This past month, we transitioned our officers and brainstormed some fun virtual ways to connect our members of ASCE together in a safe way during these times. For the month of July we have ideas such as a Netflix Party Movie night, and a Zoom game night for our social events. We have also started to work on recruiting our new freshman students. Starting college can be a very overwhelming experience, especially due to the current circumstances and many classes being transitioned to online in the fall. Since we are unable to table at freshman orientations due to them being online, we will be utilizing social media platforms such as Instagram Videos to greet the new students with a big virtual smile and to introduce them not only to the ASCE club, but to the ASCE family.

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Position: Civil (Roadway) Design Engineer II