Georgia Institute of Technology School of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Stacie Sire turned a simple conversation with a professor after class one day into a successful career rising through the ranks at Boeing, including helping shepherd the vaunted 787 Dreamliner from its very early conceptual stages to the plane now carrying thousands of passengers on long-haul flights around the world every day.

The School of Civil and Environmental Engineering added four new advisers this fall. Michael Houlihan, Emmy Montanye, Christopher Pappas and Wassim Selman joined the School’s External Advisory Board to counsel CEE’s leadership on everything from curriculum and fundraising to communications and recruiting.

“Take care of your people, and they will take care of you.” That part of Gen. Philip Breedlove’s mantra for young Air Force officers was also a key message from his remarks during the Hyatt Distinguished Alumni Leadership Speaker Series Oct. 26.

For Georgia Tech alumni Steve Curtis and Justin Norman, the commute to work involves plane flights, buses, pickup trucks and, on a good day, a helicopter. All told, it takes between six and 15 hours to get from home to work, depending on the weather and mode of travel. That’s because they’re working on a massive construction project high in the Peruvian Andes for Bechtel, building the copper concentrator for a $5 billion mine project that will be among the world’s top-producing sources of copper from its very first year.