Simpson Gumpertz & Heger (SGH)

Cheryl Saldanha, P.E. of Simpson Gumpertz & Heger (SGH) and Michael Syracuse AIA LEED AP of FXCollaborative will be delivering their presentation titled "Preserving Legacy, Building Tomorrow: Decarbonizing Landmark Skyscrapers" at Zak World of Façades North America edition on 16th October 2024 in New York. Visit the link in comments for more information on the conference and complete lineup of speakers. #zakwof #facades

Last Friday, I finished up my 12-week technical internship at Simpson Gumpertz & Heger (SGH) in the Structural Group of the Heavy Civil Division. I was welcomed by Zoe Sloane, my kind SGH “Buddy” who helped me adjust to SGH culture, and was supervised by Jason Varney and Paul Schuman. SGH is an engineering consulting company that strives for excellence in civil engineering. I chose SGH because I knew I would be exposed to many civil engineering projects and be challenged in various ways. I began my internship without any knowledge about the civil engineering industry, hoping to come out with an idea of what civil engineers do. I aimed to improve my communication skills, engage with geotechnical engineering, see what civil engineers do on site, and gain insight on project management. SGH made it possible for me to accomplish all these goals and much more. They created opportunities for me to work on more than 10 projects across different teams within SGH. During my time at SGH, I conducted structural investigations, created data acquirement forms for effective use, organized and manipulated data in Excel, helped with geotechnical litigations, presented contractor bids, created and used Python scripts for efficiency in redundant tasks, tested and inventoried electronics in the lab, redacted Controlled Unclassified Information on structural drawings, identified dimensions of buildings from hand-drawn structural drawings, wrote field reports and more. In working on projects across offices and teams, I gained connections and communication skills. Not only did I work with a range of people in the Waltham, New York and Houston offices, I also met some of SGH’s clients! This required significant coordination which I employed to keep all collaborators in the loop. This way, everyone was aware of the time I was spending on existing projects and how much time I had to spare to take on new ones. I was happy to receive a very kind word from Emily R. McCarthy, a Project Manager in the Houston office, who mentioned to my supervisor the efforts I made to manage my time successfully. Emily motivated me to continue building on these communication skills I practiced at SGH. Overall, I feel that I solidified my love of civil and structural engineering during my time at SGH. I was sad to go, but I now have a clearer perspective on my future as a civil engineer. Everyone I worked with offered valuable insight and mentorship on both my academic and professional careers. I am extremely grateful for this experience, and I look forward to branching out in the civil engineering world with the foundational experience I’ve gained from this internship. I now have a better sense of what I want to do with my career, and for that, I feel forever indebted to SGH. Thank you, Simpson Gumpertz and Heger!

Our Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Program teammates and stakeholders are hearing innovative ideas from industry representatives as part of SIOP's "Think Different, Build Better Industry Day" in Washington, D.C., Aug. 13-15. Delivering the Foundation of Fleet Readiness means being open to new approaches to meeting the infrastructure needs of our Navy’s nuclear-powered aircraft carriers and submarines.