Over the years, the School of Civil Enginnering at the UCLM has trained great professionals who have achieved great success in different areas of civil engineering. However, some students have stood out in particular in their everyday work, and have been recognised by important institutions and bodies.
María Mingallón
One of these former students is María Mingallón, who in December 2020, was awarded the "40 Under 40: Champions of Construction 2020", an international prizewinning program which annually awards prizes to 40 people under 40 years old whose work in construction is having a globally recognised impact in the construction industry.
At present, she works in New Zealand as director of automization processes and computing design for the company Mott MacDonald, a multinational which has over 16,000 employees distributed over 140 countries.
In an interview published in the newspaper Lanza, Mingallón stressed that the School of Civil Engineering “is a very innovative one in terms of training civil engineers, which is quite rare in schools in Spain”.
Beatriz Acero
Beatriz Acero is another former student from the School of Civil Engineering which has been awarded important prizes. Her thesis, entitled “Resilience of the Supply Chain: Antecedents and Drivers of Global Competitivity” in January 2021 received the CEL Award for implementing logistics management in the ‘university’ category.
Acero started her thesis six years ago at the Zaragoza Logistics Center (ZLC), a research and training institution linked to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the University of Zaragoza.
Javier Abanades
Another former student who has also been recognised on different occasions is Javier Abanades, who received the "Best Young Engineer" award in 2018 by the Madrid branch of the Association of Civil Engineers, for his extensive professional experience in the renewable energies sector in which he has contributed towards developing solutions of great technical and social importance.
In 2018 he also received the Modesto Vigueras Award as best young engineer in the maritime-coast sector (2018) for his design for the H2020 DemoGravi3 European project for the technical association of Ports and Coasts.
José Joaquín Ortega
Another graduate from our school who has obtained an award for his research is José Joaquín Ortega Parreño. His thesis entitled ‘Mechanical Damage in Concrete and other Cohesive Material’, obtained the prestigious ANCI award, which the National Association of independent Builders awards annualy in order to stimulate research on the public works sector.
This thesis, read at the School of Civil Engineering at the University of Castilla-La Mancha, was directed by Gonzalo Ruiz López and Xiaoxin Zhang, and was assessed as outstanding cum laude, and culminated in him becoming a Doctor in Civil Engineering.
