Professor Ryan Fries from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville visits the Department of Civil Engineering at Mainz University of Applied Sciences
One degree, two degrees and a unique international experience: This is the goal of the German-American double degree project under the direction of Prof. Dr. Alfons Buchmann, Head of the Department of Civil Engineering at Mainz University of Applied Sciences. The need for well-trained, interculturally experienced and linguistically proficient civil engineers is growing, especially in times of global challenges like climate change and increasing scarcity of resources.
The Department of Civil Engineering at Mainz University of Applied Sciences and the Department of Engineering at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE) will work even more closely together in the future by introducing a double degree option in their degree programs Bachelor in International Civil Engineering (BaICE) & Bachelor in Civil Engineering, in addition to regular lecture exchanges. This will give students in these degree programs the opportunity to additionally obtain a degree from the respective partner university.
After a first working visit to our American partner university in September of this year, we were pleased to welcome Professor Dr. Ryan Fries, Head of the Department of Civil Engineering at SIUE, to Mainz University of Applied Sciences from November 17 to 24. Professor Fries’ visit was sponsored by the university-wide DAAD project “Internationalization @ Home”.
A construction site visit, photo by C.Schröder
During his one-week visit, Professor Fries not only had the opportunity to get to know colleagues from the Department of Civil Engineering and the International Office better and to visit our future ‘home’ – the new building on campus. His time here was also used to continue working with Professor Buchmann on the implementation of the project Mainz-Illinois: Double Degree in International Civil Engineering and to fine-tune the curriculum of the planned degree programs with the double degree option. After all, the first students are scheduled to begin their year abroad with a double degree option in Illinois as early as next year.
In addition to working on the new degree program, Professor Fries also attended a lecture in the English-language transportation module Urban Planning and learned extensively about public transportation in the city and surrounding areas during an organized tour of Mainz’s public transportation company, the Mainzer Verkehrsbetriebe.
To round off his visit, Professor Fries kindled the enthusiasm of our students for a stay abroad and introduced our partner university, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, to interested students in the discipline of construction.
Text by Claudia Schröder
