SERVICE pROFILE
Conference Organization
Review
Membership / Leadership
Committees
Community Service
Thesis Examination
Conference Organization
Conference organizer and Chair
- Chair, Computational Wind Engineering Conference – CWE 2022, Conference, 2022/6 – 2022/6
- Session Chair (Sustainable Development), CSCE annual conference – Leadership in sustainable infrastructure, Conference, 2017/6 – 2017/6
- Session Chair (Buildings and Energy), CSCE annual conference – Leadership in sustainable infrastructure, Conference, 2017/6 – 2017/6
- Session Chair (Computational Wind Engineering and Cyberphysical Modeling), 13th Americas’ conference in wind engineering, Conference, 2017/5 – 2017/5
- Chair, Natural Disaster Mitigation Specialty Conference, CSCE, Conference, 2016/6 -2016/6
- Organizing committee member for the CSCE 2016 conference in London.
- Session Chair (Environmental flows – full scale, CFD and experimental method), 8th International Colloquium on Bluff Body Aerodynamics and Applications, Boston, MA, Conference, 2016/6 – 2016/6
- Scientific Committee Member, 8th International Colloquium on Bluff Body Aerodynamics and Applications, Boston, MA, Conference, 2016/6 – 2016/6
- Scientific Committee Member, 14th International Conference on Wind Engineering, Porto Alegre, Brazil, Conference, 2015/6 – 2015/6
- Chair Natural Disaster Mitigation Specialty Conference, CSCE 2016, London, ON.
- Scientific committee member- 14th International Conference on Wind Engineering, Porto Alegre, Brazil, June 21-26, 2015.
- Scientific committee member- 2014 Computational Wind Engineering Conference (2014 CWE), Hamburg, Germany, June 2014.
- Fluid structure interaction session organizer, CWE 2014 Conference (2014 CWE), Hamburg, Germany, June 2014.
- Architectural practices, passive designs and innovations secession chair – International Sustainable Built Environment Conference, Doha, Qatar, January 29, Wind Engineering Innovation session chair, WindEEE Scientific Symposium, October 2013.2014.
- Scientific committee member, 13th International Conference in Wind Engineering, Amsterdam, Netherlands, http://www.13ICWE.org – 13 ICWE, 2012.
- Low-rise building session chair, 2012 workshop, American Association of Wind Engineering, August 12‐14, 2012, Hyannis, MA, USA.
- Organizing/host and scientific committee member, and chair for a special session “computational evaluation of wind-induced external and internal pressure”, The 5th International Symposium in Computational Engineering, CWE2010, Charlotte, NC. http://www.cwe2010.org.
- Chair for a special session “Building envelope water tightness“, International Conference on Building Envelope Systems and Technologies, Vancouver, Canada, ICBEST 2010.
Review
Journal Review
- Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamic (Elsevier)
- Building and Environment(Elsevier)
- Engineering Structures(Elsevier)
- Sustainable Cities and Societies(Elsevier)
- Journal of Fluids and Structures (Elsevier)
- Structural Safety (Elsevier)
- Journal of Building Engineering(Elsevier)
- Wind and Structures (Techno press)
- Journal of Wind Engineering
- ASCE Natural Hazard Review
- ASCE Journal of Structural Engineering
- ASCE Journal of Engineering Materials
- ASCE Journal of Architectural Engineering
- ASCE Journal of Bridge Engineering
- ASCE Journal of Infrastructure
Proposal Review
- NSERC Discovery, NSERC CRD program, NRC and MITACS in Canada.
- National Science Foundation, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA); and US Department of Energy, NIST in the USA.
- PhD Program Review, Addis Ababa University – Reviewed the existing PhD program in the Concrete Structures and a newly proposed PhD program in Engineering Mechanics.
Membership / Leadership
- Fellow of Canadian Society of Civil Engineers.
- Associate Member American Society of Civil Engineers
- Professional Engineer, Ontario, Canada, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and Asmara, Eritrea
- Member of Council of Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat.
- Chair of CSCE Structural Dynamics Committee.
- Chair of ASCE Computational Wind Engineering task committee.
- Member ASCE Environmental Wind Engineering Committee.
- Member ASCE Wind load on Solar Panel committee.
- Founding Member, Ethiopian Science Technology Engineering Math (STEM) Network.
- Ethiopian STEM network assists the Ethiopian Ministry of Science and Technology and the two Science and Technology Universities under its umbrella located in Addis Ababa and Adama, respectively, on various STEM education-related activities. (2014-present)
- Director (research), Boundary Layer Wind Tunnel Laboratory: In collaboration with the Operation Director, look after the research integration and academic activities at the BLWTL. Act as Director on various research projects at BLWTL. Insure the science transfer to practice. (2018- present).
- Director (research), member, WindEEE Research Institute (RI): I am a member of the WindEEE Research Institute. I also act as a Research Director for WindEEE RI. I work closely with the WindEEE RI Director to make WINDEEE Dome an international and national laboratory useful to researchers in Canada and around the world. I also work with the private sector closely so that the industry become the user of this world-class wind testing facility. I direct all the research and consulting projects I bring to the WindEEE RI. (Since 2016).
- Board Member, American Association of Wind Engineers (AAWE): I work as an academic liaison, AAWE board, assisting the smooth running of the AAWE workshop. I also run the various AAWE award programs such as (i) Best Theoretical PhD Thesis Award, (ii) Best Experimental PhD-thesis Award, (iii) Service Award, and (iv) Innovation Award. In addition, I participate in other AAWE decisions making activities through a frequent conference call, in person board meetings. (2016-present)
- Board Member, International Society of Wind Engineering (ISWE): I will be the chair of the 2020 Computational Wind Engineering conference, one of the primer conference organized every four years by ISWE. As a result, I am selected to be a member of the board of ISWE that overlooks the operations of ISWE. (2018-2020).
- Western’s Site Leader for Sharcnet, Sharcnet High Performance Computing Center – I act as an interface between the Sharcnet management and the research community. I approve membership and advocate advanced computing research at Western. Through monthly conference call meeting, participate in decisions on various Sharcnet activities. (Since 2015).
Committees
Committee served at FIU
- Faculty advisor for Chi-epsilon honor society and graduate student association and took the associated training.
- CEE curriculum committee representative (2008, 2009, 2010, and 2011), during my term the department, has created dozens of courses at graduate levels, worked on department undergraduate and graduate catalog on a yearly basis, worked on major revision of the graduate student tracks and core course requirements for each specialization, worked on new professional certificate programs, worked on new combined BSc and MSc programs, etc.
- CEE Faculty search (appointments) committee member (2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011), during my term the department has hired two assistant professor and new department chair, and one unsuccessful offer to a full professor position.
- Founder and organizer: Distinguished wind/structural engineering lecture series at CEE.
- Founding member of university wide sustainable construction certificate program, a university wide effort comprised of faculties from the College of Arts and Architecture and College of Engineering and computer Science at FIU (2009). As part of this effort, Dr Bitsuamlak created a new course on sustainable building design and taught it multiple time for a multidisciplinary ground of students from Architectural, Mechanical and Materials, Environmental and Civil Engineering Departments both at undergraduate and graduate level.
- CEE news-letter editor; FIU new president installation marshal (2009).
- Co-organizer for a two day long forum “Engineering forum for rebuilding Haiti” and hosted the Rector and Vice Rector of the State University of Haiti.
- Participated in ABET mock review session in Spring 2008; Interacted and shared improvement concepts with the visiting personnel for the ABET mock review.
- FIU new president installation marshal (2009).
- Co-directed – 12-fan Wall of Wind Design and Construction Project at FIU. Founder (2008) and organizer (2008-20011): Distinguished wind/structural engineering lecture series at FIU.
Community Service
Service to the Community or Public through news articles and TV shows
- Climate responsive design in Ethiopia, Ministry of Science and Technology Information Center, Ethiopia, Ethiopian Broadcasting Corporation
- We Need a System to Build Resilient Buildings’ – Prof. Girma Tsegaye Bitsuamlak,
- Featured on SOSCIP annual impact conference and associated media include video message with my student.
- Featured on Planet-Earth (Discovery Channel) for hurricane research
- Facilitated on several media events to promote hurricane-engineering activities. ABC Good morning America – featuring Wall of Wind. Local NBC TV- Hurricane season documentary – featuring International Hurricane Research Center wind research activities. StormstruckR – Children’s story at EPCAT Center, Orlando Florida, featuring destructive Wall of Wind testing.Dr Bitsuamlak is an active participant in outreach events targeted at promoting engineering to high school students and in encouraging them to pursue engineering careers. He has published a conference paper titled “Reaching out to K-12 students — the next generation of wind engineers — while enhancing community preparedness as the first author.
- Dr Bitsuamlak was a founding member and organizer (of the first two) annual high-school Wall of Wind Contest at FIU. Each year high-school contests were designed to address specific wind engineering challenges and judged based on “hands-on” experimental results, technical report writing, and oral presentation skills. A multi-disciplinary team of judges, including educators, engineers, meteorologists, and emergency man-agers from the university and the local community, evaluated the performance of the participating student teams using merit-based ranking.
- Dr Bitsuamlak’s research team partnered with the Miami-Dade County Department of Emergency Management and the Miami Science Museum to develop, plan, coordinate and facilitate Hurricane Science & Preparedness Day at the Museum on June 19th, 2010. This public education event showcased hurricane science, mitigation, preparedness and safety, WoW research posters and live demonstrations.
- Dr Bitsuamlak regularly gave scientific tours during the yearly Engineering Expo ‘Wall of Wind’ Outreach with K-12 Students and Teachers” at FIU (2009-2011)
- Dr Bitsuamlak actively contributed to StormStruckR (http://stormstruck.com) which is an interactive exhibit located at Walt Disney World’s EPCOT (Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow) Center in Orlando, Florida.
- Reaching out high school students and participated in summer internships. One of our summer interns Daniel has finished with “Superior Performance” at Miami Dade Science Fair and he has been selected to compete in the State Science Fair.
Thesis Examination
Thesis examination committee served
- Service as chair of graduate student’s thesis examination (3)
- Service as a member of PHD Advisory Committee (12)
- Service as thesis examiner for graduate student’s thesis (PhD=35, MSc =25, Total = 60)