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Pumped up by “Pomp and Circumstance”: UC Davis 2016 Ph.D. and M.S. Graduates
Hats off—literally—-to the UC Davis masters and doctoral transportation graduates!
The enthusiasm and sense of pride following the June 9 commencement ceremony couldn’t be contained, with faculty members Dan Sperling, Susan Handy, John Harvey and Joan Ogden on hand to honor and congratulate the new graduates.
From the Transportation Technology and Policy graduate program, the 2016 class includes: Jeff Kessler, Ph.D., Kalaivani Ramea Kubendran, Ph.D., Julie Schiffman, M.S., Sydney Vergis, Ph.D., and Hang Zhou, M.S.
The Civil and Environmental Engineering transportation 2016 graduates are Yuan He, Ph.D., Erik Maroney, M.S., Jose Fabian Paniagua Fernandez, M.S., Julio Cesar Paniagua Fernandez, M.S., and David Phong, M.S.
Each graduate had a unique story to tell about the journey they took to their degree.
Jeff Kessler remarked that he was an “empty book” when he arrived at UC Davis, with fairly limited knowledge about transportation and environmental issues. He credited ITS-Davis Director Dan Sperling for being a great mentor and teacher.
Julie Schiffman related how she did the program “very differently than most everybody else”— married and with a husband and two daughters, aged six and eight. “There were a lot of things to balance,” she said. Every night, she got her daughters to bed at the same time, “regardless of whether there was a test the next day.”
Loved ones, family and friends who were on hand made the ceremony truly special for the graduates.
Twin brothers Jose and Julio Paniagua Fernandez paid special tribute to a family member who wasn’t there, their Dad, who passed away earlier this year. “To complete our goals, we had to overcome a lot to be here today,” said Julio. The brothers will now pursue their Ph.D. degrees in transportation here at UC Davis.
Nevada Department of Transportation’s Sondra Rosenberg: Shaping Policies in the Public Sphere
Nevada DOT’s Sondra Rosenberg (right) is shown here with Michael Kies, Arizona DOT Assistant Director, Multimodal Planning. Rosenberg and Kies served as co-project managers on the I-11 & Intermountain West Corridor Study.
By Alicia Nguyen
As the Assistant Director for Planning for the Nevada Department of Transportation (NDOT), Sondra Rosenberg, M.S., Transportation Technology and Policy (TTP), 2005, is making a difference and playing a significant role in the public sphere.
Rosenberg has been managing and actively participating in transportation and research projects with NDOT since 2008. She coordinated the multi-state Interstate-15 mobility alliance, and played a major role in the development of Interstate 11. With her promotion to the Assistant Director position in September 2014, Rosenberg supervises several departmental divisions, including Multimodal Planning and Program Development, Transportation Data, Traffic Safety and Performance Analysis. She is also in charge of coordinating project funding, grant opportunities and represents NDOT on national committees and conferences.
“One of the big things that I participated in this week was the MPO (Metropolitan Planning Organization) certification review. Every four years, the Federal Highway Administration and Federal Transit Administration review MPOs to ensure they are meeting federal requirements and guidelines. I was there to represent NDOT as a major partner agency,” Rosenberg said. “It’s rewarding to me because the last time they had a review, they found some things that needed fixing. This time they had a few suggestions, but they found no problems, basically saying ‘MPO and NDOT, you’re doing a great job.’”
Prior to landing at her current public agency, Rosenberg explored a lot of alternative career options. After finishing her degree in physics, Rosenberg decided that she preferred work that had a more direct connection to people’s lives. She intended to study energy policy when she enrolled at the UC Davis Institute of Transportation Studies (ITS-Davis) but soon discovered her passion in transportation policy.
“I thought I could start [at ITS-Davis] and then go to Berkeley’s Energy and Resources Group, but once I got to Davis and learned how transportation affected my life, it got more and more exciting to me. There’s that relatability to what I do and how it affects people’s lives, and the more I learned, the more I got interested in transportation, shaping policies, and having conversations about how it affects our daily lives.”
ITS-Davis’ unique transportation research program puts dual focus on policy and engineering, which Rosenberg found a bit challenging to explain when she first started applying to jobs after finishing her degree.
“It’s hard to translate, but the benefit is that the combination of exposure to engineering as well as planning and policy aspects is very useful and a lot of government agencies understand that,” Rosenberg said. “Davis really prepared me for the policy and funding part. That connection to the state government is strong at UC Davis and I think you just don’t get that anywhere else.”
After receiving her master’s degree, Rosenberg worked from 2004 to 2008 at Fehr and Peers, a firm that provides transportation and planning services to public and private sector clients. She then served as a National Parks Transportation scholar, before joining NDOT.
Rosenberg still keeps in contact with peers and faculty from ITS-Davis, and finds herself constantly bumping into colleagues at meetings in Washington D.C. or at conferences all over the country. In addition, Rosenberg has recently reached out to ITS-faculty members Dan Sperling and Susan Handy to recruit students into vacant positions at NDOT. ITS-Davis students are a great fit, she adds.
Rosenberg’s experience at ITS-Davis, coupled with her competence and determination, enabled her to be promoted to her current position at NDOT much sooner than she had expected.
“There are very few places in the country that offer the program that UC Davis does and it’s so important for what we do in transportation, so I feel very fortunate that I went there and landed a job in transportation and was able to use the skills I learned.”
Photos courtesy of Nevada Department of Transportation
The #AggiesAtWork series is done in partnership with the UC Davis Cal Aggie Alumni Association.
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Graduate Students Awarded Transportation Fellowships, Scholarships
By Alicia Nguyen
Several Transportation and Technology Policy (TTP) graduate students have been recognized for their accomplishments during this 2015-2016 academic year with fellowships and scholarships that help to sponsor their studies and research. The TTP program is hosted by the UC Davis Institute of Transportation Studies.
Calvin Thigpen and Dillon Fitch-Polse, both TTP Ph.D. candidates, are among the recipients of the prestigious Dwight David Eisenhower Transportation Fellowships—among150-200 Eisenhower Fellowships typically awarded nationally. Thigpen and Fitch-Polse were each awarded $5,000 fellowships.
Calvin Thigpen, who was a recipient of a Dwight David Eisenhower Transportation Fellowship, along with Dillon Fitch-Polse.
Thigpen’s dissertation research examines how young people are affected by “mobility capital,” which is determined by their own travel experiences. In addition to his Eisenhower Fellowship, Thigpen was awarded the Jarena Wright Fellowship, a nine-month fellowship awarded to continuing graduate students from Santa Rosa, Calif.
Fitch-Polse is studying how road environments influence travel behavior for bicyclists. He also is considering ways this research could be used to create a sustainable transportation plan. Both Thigpen and Fitch-Polse presented their current findings at the Transportation Research Board’s 95th Annual Meeting in Washington D.C., in January.
Gouri Mishra, also a TTP Ph.D. candidate, was awarded the UC Davis Graduate Research Mentorship Fellowship for the 2015-2016 academic year. The fellowship promotes diversity within the field of transportation studies and is only awarded to six students per year. Mishra’s dissertation research involves the effects of mobility options, such as ridesharing, on travel behavior. Mishra was also awarded the Ernest E. Hill Fellowship in 2015, which supports students’ research to address the impacts of global warming.
During the fall quarter of 2015, Jeff Kessler, who recently completed his TTP Ph.D. degree, received the UC Davis Malcolm Stacey Fellowship, which is awarded annually to one or two Jewish students who are pursuing a career in engineering. Kessler’s research focuses on developmental approaches to technological innovation that can be used to help policy makers determine where resources can be dedicated to promote innovation more efficiently.
At the WTS Sacramento “Advancing Women in Transportation” annual awards and scholarship dinner in January, TTP graduate students Sarah Strand and Julie Schiffman, and UC Davis seniors Jordon Costello and Kelly Andrews, were awarded scholarships for their achievements in transportation studies. Strand and Schiffman, both M.S. students, were awarded prestigious Helene M. Overly Memorial Graduate Scholarships.
WTS Sacramento undergraduate and graduate scholarship winners (from left): Jordan Costello, Julie Schiffman, Kelly Andrews, and Sarah Strand—along with high school scholarship winner, Zelia Gonzales.
Strand is building her background in city planning while conducting research on land-use, transportation, and climate policies.
“I’m honored to be the 2015 recipient of the WTS graduate scholarship in memory of Helene M. Overly, who dedicated 15 years of public service,” said Strand. “Upon graduation, I hope to work on planning and policy at a public agency helping to prepare California for the impacts of climate change.”
Schiffman is researching equity implications as they relate to zero emission vehicle rebates.
“I’m proud and honored to receive recognition from a professional group of women within the transportation industry,” said Schiffman. “I hope to continue working on such important topics and use the skills I learned at ITS in a professional career after graduation this spring.”
UC Davis seniors Jordon Costello and Kelly Andrews were also recognized for their efforts in transportation studies at the event. Costello, who majors in environmental policy and planning, received the Sharon D. Banks Memorial Undergraduate Scholarship, which awards female students planning to pursue a transportation-related field. Andrews, a civil engineering major, won the Bimla G. Rhinehart Leadership Scholarship, which recognizes undergraduate women in transportation studies who demonstrate leadership skills.
For MTC’s David Ory, People & Community are Key to Transportation Planning
By Alicia Nguyen
As a principal planner and head of the Analytical Services team at the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), David Ory—Ph. D. in Civil Engineering, UC Davis, 2007—finds the human behavior aspect of transportation particularly rewarding.
MTC is the Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area. Its primary responsibilities include distributing federal and state transportation funds, such as for highways and public transportation, and coordinating and leading long-term transportation planning for the region. Ory, who has been working with MTC since 2009, leads a team of eleven data scientists and urban planners.
“The big project we’re working on right now is an update to our regional transportation plan. Every four years, one of the requirements of the MPO is to make an outline for the investment plan for the region. In California, the long-range plan is also the ‘sustainable communities strategy’, which is a coordinated transportation and land use plan that strives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” Ory said. “We also do a big project assessment effort as part of the plan in which we rank each project presented to us in terms of cost-benefit and whether or not it’s consistent with the plan’s adopted goals.”
Ory is particularly invested in the way his work interacts with people and the community. “When you get into engineering, you do a lot of modeling of physical systems,” Ory said. “If you have a building you have to think about ‘how can I make this building not collapse.’ In transportation planning and travel behavior, you get to use a lot of math and statistics, but instead of working with buildings, you work with people. So I really like the aspect that works with human behavior and human happiness.”
Ory finds his career particularly rewarding, and sees it as a way to give back to the community. True to his passion, Ory also encourages ITS-Davis students to take advantage of the university’s resources in order to do research that benefits people.
“[Some students] might research what just seems more interesting or what their advisor thinks is more interesting. I think it’s always good to step back and see which topic is more useful to humanity—and that one may be more interesting in the end. Once you get into the academic wheel it’s difficult to keep the big picture in perspective. In the long run, it’s hard, but it’s always good to do what’s good for society.”
As a person who enjoys a challenge, Ory found that ITS-Davis’ curriculum in engineering and statistics allowed him to test his skills and knowledge. In addition, he noted that the array of disciplines that ITS-Davis offered was particularly unique and allowed him to branch out and exchange ideas with colleagues who were in differing, but related, fields. He stays in contact with and gets different points of views and new insight from other alumni as their careers progress and he encourages current students to embrace the opportunities that UC Davis provides.
“I think one thing that’s really great about UC Davis is the very diverse set of career paths laid out in front of you. Take advantage of that, get to know people, and try to understand what they do because that can help you. The students and faculty have a really diverse set of interests and I think that’s unique to Davis.”
The #AggiesAtWork series is done in partnership with the UC Davis Cal Aggie Alumni Association.
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February 2016 Director’s Letter
Educating the New Leaders in Sustainable Transportation
Paris Climate Accord: A Strong Call to Action, Including Transportation
Read the blog post here.
An American (Transportation Researcher) in Paris: Report from “COP21” Global Climate Conference
Read the blog post here.
Alumna Julia Sohnen’s Career Charges Forward with BMW
As an advanced technology engineer for the BMW Group Technology Office, Julia Sohnen, M.S., Transportation Technology and Policy (TTP), works to improve sustainable mobility and innovation with one of the largest automobile manufacturers in the world — all within the heart of California’s Silicon Valley.
Sohnen conducts customer research for the BMW i ChargeForward program. This program partners with California’s Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) to study how electric vehicles can operate as a flexible load on the electricity grid through the forward-looking concept known as smart charging. The idea is to manage at-home electric vehicle charging to help the utility manage peak load, stabilize the grid, and provide cleaner source energy.
When PG&E is experiencing peak load conditions, participating BMW i3 electric vehicle owners who volunteered for the ChargeForward program may be asked to delay charging for up to an hour. Owners can choose to opt out of any single delayed charging request. All of this research is being conducted locally in the San Francisco Bay area.
“Now that the program has started, my responsibility is managing all the customer research and establishing research goals,” Sohnen said. “We want to explore how to better match charging of the electric vehicles to dynamic energy supply sources.” While Sohnen conducts fresh research in automotive innovation, she likes to stay connected to her Aggie network, tracing her beginnings with BMW back to ITS-Davis and its multidisciplinary TTP program.
Sohnen, like many recent graduates, did some soul-searching before arriving at her position with BMW. With a background in mechanical and aerospace engineering, she started her career working for Boeing Satellite Systems in Los Angeles. Realizing that she wanted to shift her focus to sustainability, Sohnen left Boeing to return to school.
“I wanted to apply my control systems background to energy systems. A former professor at Cornell suggested ITS-Davis, specifically for the STEPS (Sustainable Transportation Energy Pathways) program. The transportation-energy pathways and the infrastructure component really aligned well with where I wanted to go next. It was a perfect fit.”
At ITS-Davis, there is no average student, typical path, or standard curriculum. Students develop their own multidisciplinary program. The flexibility of the TTP program combined with Sohnen’s clear goals and aspirations led her to her current profession. It turns out Sohnen’s thesis on carbon emissions associated with charging electric vehicles is a timely topic related to her current work.
“Through that thesis and the connections I made in the STEPS program, I was able find this position,” Sohnen explained.
Sohnen took advantage of networking opportunities with BMW and other automobile companies, made available to her through the ITS-Davis STEPS program. She networked with several BMW engineers at the STEPS symposia and reached out to her connections when beginning her job hunt. She is now approaching her third year with BMW, working on second-life battery research and technology scouting, in addition to the BMW i ChargeForward program.
“Students should realize the advantage of the program and how Davis is a strong network for state agencies, other universities, and industries,” Sohnen reflected. “There are a lot of talented people that come out of ITS-Davis and stay in this electric vehicle space. These are the people you will be constantly running into for the rest of your career.”
The #AggiesAtWork series is done in partnership with the UC Davis Cal Aggie Alumni Association.
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