About Carol Smith
Carol was born in Moncton, NB, and at age 3 moved to London Ontario, then at age 9 moved to North Vancouver. Carol was exceedingly bright and talented. She graduated from Handsworth Secondary at age 16. She obtained a degree in Zoology from UBC at age 20, and then went on to complete her degree in Civil Engineering, also from UBC. Carol received her Professional Engineer designation at 26 and practiced engineering for 23 years. She was a highly skilled Traffic Engineer and was well respected by her peers.
Carol started her career with the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure in the Development Approval section of the South Coast Region. Carol’s goal was to be a professional engineer so she applied for the Ministry’s EIT program and following acceptance she moved to Victoria. Carol flourished as an engineer; she was passionate about figuring things out, trying to make the system work efficiently for public safety. After a stint in the planning section she decided that Traffic Engineering was her calling. She loved nothing more than calculating a complicated progression analysis along the Ministry’s highway networks. She worked tirelessly expecting nothing less than perfection from herself.
She returned to the South Coast Region to work in Traffic Operations and then decided to try Municipal operations with the Township of Langley. The island was calling and Carol left government in 1991 to move back to Victoria and work with Transtech Data Services. She had a long career with Transtech building up their collection services, liaising with clients and having fun developing the company.
After leaving Transtech, Carol worked for ICBC on their Safer Cities Program where she reviewed intersection safety for intersections and recommended improvements to reduce crashes. She also worked for PBA Engineering performing traffic analysis and signing design. Her last project for PBA Engineering was a big one. She was the lead engineer for designing the guide signing on the Port Mann Highway 1 – Port Mann Bridge projects. These projects covered over 35 kilometres of highway, over 30 new structures with capital costs of over a billion dollars.
Carol was an active member of the Institute of Transportation Engineers. She served on the ITE Vancouver Island Section executive board as a member-at-large (2005 to 2009). She also volunteered as registration chair for the CITE annual conference, which was held in Victoria in 2008.
Carol became a Warden of Iron Ring Camp 23 (of the national Corporation of the Seven Wardens) in January, 2004. Carol was an enthusiastic member of the Camp from the outset and her pride in her professional calling resonated well with the University of Victoria’s graduating engineering students as they were obligated and received their iron rings each spring. She lead a review of the conduct of the Obligation Ceremony which resulted in its script becoming more welcoming to female engineering participants and she supported the holding of a second Ceremony annually to broaden the opportunity for graduands convocating in the autumn to participate. Her engaging personality, her respected quest for excellence and her good humour will be very much missed by her colleagues
The impact of your support
Carol was deeply committed to the field of engineering, and led the way as a woman in engineering long before this was common. Women are still underrepresented in the field.
In honour of Carol’s legacy to her profession, a scholarship fund in Carol’s name will be established to support promising female civil engineers studying at UBC, helping to raise awareness to the value of diversity, and to encourage academic, leadership, professional, and personal development for women engineering students.
Your gift will honour Carol’s memory, and help to support a talented female student pursue a career in engineering.
List of Donors
All Donors-
Tom, Carolyn and David French
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Barbara Thomas
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Sandra Schmid
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Don Henderson
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Joseph & Michelle Jacobs
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Debra Woods & Aubrey Eichel
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David & Rosanne Queen
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Gerald Clancy
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Carolann and Gary Steinhoff
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colin smith
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Charlotte Gann
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Patricia & Lou Benasi