WISCONSIN » ENGINEERING » CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL » MAKE A GIFT TO CEE

Building on a legacy

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering memorial scholarship and professorship funds are administered by the University of Wisconsin Foundation. Colleagues, former students, corporations and foundations have joined to contribute to these funds to honor respected leaders in civil and environmental engineering. Please join us in this sterling tribute.

Gifts to the UW Foundation may be in the form of cash, appreciated securities, personal or real property. Pledges may be made over a period of years. Gifts to the UW Foundation are fully tax deductible.

For more information please contact:

Debra Holt, Managing Senior Director of Development
University of Wisconsin Foundation
1848 University Avenue
Madison, WI 53726
608/263-0779
deb.holt@
uwfoundation.wisc.edu

For more information about the memorial scholarships, professorships, graduate fellowships or other industry reinvestment opportunities, please contact:

Jeffrey S. Russell, PhD, PE
Professor and Chair, CEE Development Committee
2205 Engineering Hall
1415 Engineering Drive
Madison, WI 53706-1691
608/262-7244
russell@engr.wisc.edu

Remembered worldwide for generosity

Professor Peter J. Bosscher died November 18, 2007. Born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, he attended Calvin College and earned his PhD in civil engineering from the University of Michigan. For the next 26 years, he served as an active member of the UW-Madison Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering.

A geotechnical engineer, Peter studied many aspects related to soil-structure interactions, developed data-collection systems for a variety of applications, and investigated how to incorporate waste materials into materials used in construction.

However, while his professional expertise was in soils and foundations, his career was defined by a passion for helping people. In 2002, to emphasize to students that learning and service go hand in hand, he founded and advised the UW-Madison chapter of Engineers Without Borders (EWB), a student group that has traveled to Africa, South America, Asia and elsewhere in the United States to help communities build sustainable basic infrastructure systems.

Through his work with EWB, Peter hoped not only to improve residents’ quality of life in those countries, but also to provide his students the opportunity to examine societal, ethical, environmental, economical and cultural impacts of their work as engineers. In those projects, and in his students, Peter’s heart and his desire to make a difference live on.

As part of Engineers Without Borders, an international service organization, Peter Bosscher led UW-Madison volunteer student groups on projects to help build water storage and filtration systems in Rwandan villages. (large image)

A group of UW-Madison student members of Engineers Without Borders returned from Rwanda in summer 2004 after a successful trip there. The group improved water quality and quantity, stabilized a landslide area, improved the stability of the pipe at a river crossing and prepared for the next phase of their project, tapping into a new water source. (large image)

Building an erosion-control structure at the river crossing of a water pipeline. (large image)