UT Tyler Wins 2023 Regional ASCE Concrete Canoe Competition

May 3, 2023

UT Tyler Wins 2023 Regional ASCE Concrete Canoe Competition

Office of Marketing and Communications

May 3, 2023

Media Contact:  Hannah Buchanan
Editor/Writer–Strategic Communications & Media Relations
Marketing and Communications
The University of Texas at Tyler
903.539.7196 (cell)

The University of Texas at Tyler won the 2023 American Society of Civil Engineering Texas-Mexico Region 6 Concrete Canoe Competition. This is UT Tyler’s second overall first place finish since winning regionals in 2012.

With this year’s canoe entry, “Camoo,” the UT Tyler ASCE student chapter placed first in design paper and oral presentation and second in the final product category. The team now advances to the national competition to be held next month at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville.

“It has been a long time since we won this event, and this is very exciting for us,” said faculty adviser Dr. Michael McGinnis, UT Tyler professor and civil engineering department chair. “I could not be prouder of our group as they demonstrated excellent teamwork and technical prowess.”

At the annual competition, participants build canoes with concrete and are judged in four categories: technical design report, oral design presentation, canoe final product and racing.

UT Tyler team members are Esther Fajardo of Longview, Omar Acuña of Marshall and Hannah McGinnis of Tyler, team captains; and Angel Suarez of Mineola; Bradley Smith of Waxahachie; Bryan Gluck of Jacksonville; Chandler Hosch of Giddings; Christopher McMillan of Gilmer; Ernesto Colorado of Henderson; Gerardo Perez of Terrell; Karen Rivera of Gladewater; Keagan Rios of Caddo Mills; Luis Ortiz of Kaufman; Manuel Salazar of Sherman; Mason Mattern of Elkhart; Riley Christian of Lindale; Russell Rinehart of Longview; Samuel Acuña of Marshall; Steven Luna of Mount Pleasant; Tyrus Krueger of Kingwood; Victory Amos-Nwankwo of Houston; Zachary Wilson of Abilene; and Lidia Cabrera and Samuel Gentry, both of Tyler.

As the largest ASCE student symposium worldwide, Region 6 consists of Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico and Mexico and includes schools such as UT Austin, University of Houston, University of Oklahoma, New Mexico State University, Tech de Monterrey and Universidad Autonoma del Estado de Morelos.

With a mission to improve educational and health care outcomes for East Texas and beyond, UT Tyler offers more than 80 undergraduate and graduate programs to 10,000 students. UT Tyler recently merged with The University of Texas Health Science Center at Tyler (now known as UT Tyler Health Science Center). Through its alignment with UT Tyler Health Science Center (HSC) and UT Health East Texas, UT Tyler has unified these entities to serve Texas with quality education, cutting-edge research and excellent patient care. Classified by Carnegie as a doctoral research institution and by U.S. News & World Report as a national university, UT Tyler has campuses in Tyler, Longview, Palestine and Houston.