Engineering Educators Elect First Black Woman President

WIT note: Congratulations to our dear friend Dr. Bev Watford! She is an amazing role model and leader, as well as a personal mentor to our own Maui High superstar, Kyra Vila — 2016 Virginia Tech Engineering graduate.

Bevlee Watford, associate dean for academic affairs at Virginia Tech’s College of Engineering, has become the first black woman to be president-elect of the American Society for Engineering Education.

Her one-year term as president begins in June 2017. Watford, who also is director of the university’s Center for the Enhancement of Engineering Diversity, has boosted graduation and retention rates of underrepresented groups, says Virginia Tech. With 9,780 total undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in 2015-16, engineering is the university’s largest college.