Prospective Students
Overview
What is Civil Engineering? Though you may not realize it, your life is impacted by a civil engineer everyday, several times a day. Civil engineers make safe travel possible by designing roadways, airports, and seaports. Civil engineers make safe shelter possible by designing schools, office buildings, hospitals, and shopping centers. Civil engineers make safe living possible by designing water and waste treatment plants, by managing air pollution from manufacturing facilities, and by managing water from storm events. Our quality of life would be dramatically different without civil engineers. And with the increased use of technology to monitor and manage infrastructure assets, the importance of civil engineering in our daily lives is only going to increase.
Traditionally, civil engineering consists of six subdisciplines; environmental, geotechnical (soil), materials, structures, transportation, and water resources. With our focus on the application of technology to the long-term management of an infrastructure asset, Texas State is introducing a new subdiscipline, Technology-enhanced Infrastructure (TEI).
Environmental
Use the principles of engineering, soil science, biology, and chemistry to improve recycling, waste disposal, public health, and water and air pollution control.
Geotechnical
Conceive, analyze, and design foundations and retaining structures for infrastructure assets such as buildings, bridges, roadways, and tunnels.
Materials
Study the properties and performance of materials, such as asphalt, composites, concrete, metals, wood, and nanomaterials, used to construct infrastructure assets.
Structures
Conceive, analyze, and design infrastructure projects including buildings, bridges, tunnels, sports stadiums and arenas, water supply systems, waste treatment plants and more.
Transportation
Plan, design, and operate urban and rural streets, interstate and state highways, airports, ship yards, harbors, mass transit systems and more.
Water Resources
Plan, analyze, design, and manage systems, and specify equipment, that manages water and stormwater so that water.
Technology-Enhanced Infrastructure
Monitor, manage, and maintain infrastructure assets such that they remain safe for public use, retain their economic value, and continue to perform as intended.
Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Outlook Handbook