Structural Engineering
Engagement and Equity
National Presence
2023 SE3 National Symposium:
Engagement and Equity in the Structural Engineering Profession
This half-day program is the second Structural Engineering Engagement and Equity (SE3) Symposium to be held in conjunction with a national engineering conference since the 2019 NCSEA Summit. As part of this program, attendees will participate in five separate sessions focused on various aspects of engagement, retention, diversity and inclusion. They will learn about SE3 initiatives and activities, hear from industry panelists on the state of our profession, and acquire practical strategies and best practices for improving retention within their organizations.
Registration fee is $200 (members of NCSEA)/$300 (nonmember) per person. Summit registration is not required to attend. Click here for more information and to register.
Who Should Attend
The event is for engineers of all levels, business owners, human resource managers, and anyone within the AEC industry who is interested in promoting dialogue on engagement and equity in the structural engineering profession.
Thank you to our SE3 Symposium sponsor, AISC!
2020 NCSEA / SE3 Summit Overview
As part of the 2020 NCSEA Summit program, attendees had the opportunity to participate in three sessions developed by the SE3 Committee. They learned about the findings from the 2020 SE3 survey as well as engaged with industry panelists. The conversations focused on topics currently in the national spotlight and how their effects translate into the structural engineering profession. Attendees gained insight from engineers around the country and acquired practical strategies and best practices for improving retention within their organizations.
Photo courtesy of SEAONC SE3.
2019 Symposium Overview
The NCSEA SE3 committee held their first national symposium in conjunction with the 2019 NCSEA Summit in Anaheim, CA on November 12th, 2019. The title and theme of the program was A Reimagined Workplace: How to Navigate and Elevate the Future of our Profession. The attendance list included over 150 people in various stages of their career from across the AEC industry.
The half-day event featured key-note speaker Jamie Claire Kiser, Managing Principal at Zweig Group and founder of ElevateHer, who spoke on her experience as a business consultant to AEC firms. She shared ideas for establishing practices that improve recruitment and retention of women and minorities in the industry, stressing the importance of engaging management in these discussions by framing inclusive workplace practices as good business decisions.
Photo courtesy of Natalie Tse
Check out the 2019 Symposium Recap to learn more about the event and download slides from some of the presentations.
Photo courtesy of Natalie Tse
Three focused sessions followed the key-note speech. The first session provided snapshots of key findings from the 2018 SE3 survey, presented by NCSEA SE3 committee members. These short presentations included key takeaways and recommended practices related to retention and burnout, mentorship, work-life balance, career pathways, and performance review.
In the second session, titled “Navigating Common Experiences in the Life of a Structural Engineer,” four industry leaders shared their varied pathways to career success, discussing self-advocacy, career transitions, and how they dealt with different challenges along the way. The last session featured engineers sharing their experiences with implementing diversity and inclusion programs at their firms.
Rose McClure, current chair of the NCSEA SE3 Committee, and co-founder of SE3, shared her reflections of where and how the SE3 committee started, highlighting the committee’s accomplishments, and where we’ve come since the committee’s inception five years ago.