Cynthia Roe, a Civil Engineering student at Oregon Tech, has been selected as the recipient of the 2021-22 Women’s Transportation Seminar (WTS) Portland Chapter Gail Achterman Leadership Scholarship valued at $7,000. This is a highly competitive scholarship with applicants from colleges and universities throughout Oregon and Washington.
Originally from Weed, California, Cynthia is a first-generation college student in the graduate program at Oregon Tech. Her graduate project involves driver and pedestrian behavior at suburban mid-clock crossings with rectangular rapid-flashing beacon (rrfb) signals. Cynthia's research work is supported by fellowships from NITC (the National Institute for Transportation & Communities).
Cynthia is an extremely dedicated student who, in addition to her work with the ITE Student Chapter, served as the 2019-20 president of the American Society of Civil Engineers-Associated General Contractors Student Chapter and serves as a peer consultant in the Oregon Tech Student Success Center.
Civil Engineering graduate program director, Dr. Roger Lindgren, points to the AGC-ASCE board of mostly women as a testament to Cynthia’s efforts to recruit and support outstanding female students to serve.
Angela Rogge PE, an engineer with David Evans & Associates and WTS Portland Scholarship Chair, shared this with Cynthia when announcing the award: "...the review committee was especially impressed by your journey in pursuing higher education and your commitment to transportation and equity".
WTS selects scholars in part based on their commitment to achieving equity within communities and the transportation sector. Cynthia’s professor and academic advisor noted her ability to move beyond traditional traffic engineering evaluation techniques to try to capture how racial, gender and socio-economic profiles affect driver yielding behavior in her graduate research. Cynthia’s own lived experience has helped her recognize the importance of crafting safe and equitable transportation systems as a way to ensure all people can use designed systems no matter their physical ability, socioeconomic status, or neighborhood.
Due to COVID concerns, the formal scholarship award will take place at a virtual WTS award ceremony in early February 2022 in place of WTS Portland's usual in-person scholarship dinner.
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