News Detail

ACI Announces New Officers for 2016

4/25/2016

The American Concrete Institute (ACI) introduced its 2016-2017 president, vice president, and four board members during The Concrete Convention and Exposition in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA, this month.

Michael J. Schneider has been elected to serve as president of the Institute for 2016-2017, David A. Lange has been elected ACI vice president for a two-year term, and Khaled Walid Awad is now the Institute’s senior vice president, which is also a two-year term. Additionally, four members have been elected to serve on the ACI Board of Direction, each for three-year terms: Frances T. Griffith, R. Doug Hooton, Neven Krstulovic-Opara, and Antonio Nanni.

President

Michael J. Schneider, FACI, is the Senior Vice President and Chief People Officer at Baker Concrete Construction, Inc. He has been with Baker Concrete in Monroe, OH, for over 38 years. He started at Baker as a Project Manager in 1978 and helped open Baker’s Houston, TX, office in 1982. During his career, he has been involved in a multitude of projects ranging from high-rise offices to automotive plants to mainline concrete paving.

Schneider was named a Fellow of ACI in 2006. He previously served on the ACI Board of Direction and as Chair of the Strategic Development Council (SDC) and the ACI Foundation, of which he is currently a Trustee. He received the ACI Roger H. Corbetta Concrete Constructor Award in 2011. He is a member of the Concrete Research Council (CRC), and ACI Committees 117, Tolerances; 132, Responsibility in Concrete Construction; and S801, Student Activities.

Schneider is the current Chairman of the National Steering Committee for the Construction Industry Management Program (CIM). He has been active in the American Society of Concrete Contractors (ASCC) for the past 18 years and served as President during 2005 and 2006. During 2001 and 2002, he was a member of the Board of Directors for the National Center of Construction Education and Research (NCCER). Schneider has served as Co-Chair of the Contractor Task Group for the National Ready Mixed Concrete Association’s P2P Task Force, and Board member and Past Chair for the Concrete Promotion Council of Southwest Ohio. In 2005, Concrete Construction magazine named him as one of the 10 most influential people in the concrete industry.

Schneider is committed to eliminating all worker injuries on the jobsite. He is a charter member of the Incident and Injury Free Executive Forum, which is dedicated to promoting worker safety in the construction industry. He was also the 2012 recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Spirit of Construction Foundation of Greater Cincinnati.

He received his BS in personnel management from Miami University, Oxford, OH, and his BS in construction management from the University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH.

Vice President

David A. Lange, FACI, is Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Narbey Khachaturian Faculty Scholar at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Champaign, IL. He joined the faculty of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering in 1992. A long-time ACI member, Lange has served on the Board of Direction and is a Past Chair of the ACI Technical Activities Committee, the Publications Committee, and the Board Outlook 2030 Task Group. He currently is a member of the Financial Advisory Committee, International Advisory Committee, and Faculty Network, and ACI Committees 236, Material Science of Concrete; 237, Self-Consolidating Concrete; 241, Nanotechnology of Concrete; and 544, Fiber-Reinforced Concrete. 

Lange received the ACI Wason Medal for Most Meritorious Paper in 2003. He has been recognized as a Fellow of the American Ceramic Society and he received a J. William Fulbright Scholar Award in 2013. Lange served as the Associate Department Head for Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign from 2004-2010. He has directed the Center of Excellence for Airport Technology at the University of Illinois since 2004.

Lange received his BS in civil engineering from Valparaiso University, Valparaiso, IN, in 1981; his MBA from Wichita State University, Wichita, KS, in 1984; and his PhD in civil engineering from Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, in 1991.

Directors

Frances T. Griffith, FACI, is the Associate Director of the Center for Training Transportation Professionals (CTTP), Department of Civil Engineering, at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR. CTTP provides training, certification, and continuing education for transportation industry personnel. She has been an active ACI member since 2003 and was named a Fellow in 2014. 

Griffith is Chair of the ACI Educational Activities Committee, which recently launched ACI University. She participates in ACI certification programs at the local and national level. She is a member of several certification committees, including ACI Committees C601, New Certification Programs; C610, Field Technician Certification; C620, Laboratory Technician Certification, where she serves as Secretary; C631, Concrete Transportation Construction Inspector Certification; and C640, Craftsmen Certification Quality Review.

She is Past Chair of C630, Construction Inspector Certification. Griffith previously served on the Certification Programs Committee, and in 2014 she received the ACI Certification Award. 

Griffith is also a member of ACI’s Convention Committee, ETC Product Development Committee, Financial Advisory Committee, Executive Committee Task Group on Mission-Driven International Activities, Membership Committee, and ACI Committees 118, Use of Digital Technology; S801, Student Activities; and E905, Training Programs.

She is a 1998 recipient of the ACI Peter D. Courtois Concrete Construction Scholarship and was named the 2001 Mack Blackwell Rural Transportation Center Student of the Year. 

Griffith has been a member of the Arkansas Chapter – ACI since 2000, serving on the Board and as President in 2008. She is a member of ASTM Committee C09, Concrete and Aggregates. She participates on the Concrete Field Testing Committee for the Arkansas Ready Mixed Concrete Association and served as Co-Chair for several years.

She received her BS and MS in civil engineering from the University of Arkansas in 1998 and 2010, respectively.

R. Doug Hooton, FACI, is a Professor and NSERC/Cement Association of Canada Senior Industrial Research Chair in Concrete Durability and Sustainability in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada. His research has focused on the durability performance of cementitious materials in concrete as well as on performance testing and specifications. His durability research has encompassed most forms of concrete degradation, including sulfate resistance, acid resistance, alkali-aggregate reaction, corrosion, and freezing and thawing, as well as deicer salt scaling. Prior to joining the University of Toronto in 1986, he was an engineer in the Research Division at Ontario Hydro in Toronto.

Hooton is Chair of ACI Committee 233, Ground Slag in Concrete, and Chair of ACI Subcommittee 130-A, Materials, as well as Secretary of ACI Committee 201, Durability of Concrete. He is a member of numerous ACI committees, including 130, Sustainability of Concrete; 221, Aggregates; 225, Hydraulic Cements; 232, Fly Ash in Concrete; 234, Silica Fume in Concrete; 236, Material Science of Concrete; 240, Natural Pozzolans; 329, Performance Criteria for Ready Mixed Concrete; 365, Service Life Prediction; S801, Student Activities; Faculty Network; and Innovation Task Group 10, Alternative Cementitious Materials. He also serves on ACI Subcommittee 318-A, General, Concrete, and Construction.

Hooton was a co-recipient of the ACI Wason Medal for the Most Meritorious Paper in 2015. He received the ACI Foundation Robert E. Philleo Award in 2013 and the ACI Arthur R. Anderson Medal in 2011. He is also a Past President of the Ontario Chapter – ACI (1989).

He is a Fellow of ASTM International, the American Ceramic Society, RILEM, the Engineering Institute of Canada, and the Canadian Academy of Engineering. He is a member of several Canadian Standards Association (CSA), ASTM, and RILEM technical committees. He is Chair of the RILEM Educational Activities Committee; Vice-Chair of CSA Committee A3001, Hydraulic Cements; Vice-Chair of ASTM Committee 01, Hydraulic Cements; and Chair of ASTM Subcommittees C01.29, Sulfate Resistance, and C09.67, Concrete’s Resistance to its Environment.

Hooton is a licensed professional engineer in the Province of Ontario, Canada.

Neven Krstulovic-Opara, FACI, is the Engineering Associate with ExxonMobil, Spring, TX, leading the structural engineering research (Arctic) group of ExxonMobil’s Upstream Research Company. His 25-year professional career spans academic, design, and failure analysis leadership experience. He has spent 11 years as a Professor at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI; Northeastern University, Boston, MA; and North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, where, as principal investigator, he led a series of National Science Foundation (NSF) research projects on the development and structural use of “smart” and high-performance fiber composites.

Prior to joining ExxonMobil, Krstulovic-Opara spent 6 years as a Managing Engineer and Lead Designer conducting failure analysis as well as designing numerous liquefied natural gas (LNG) tanks, waterfront, and offshore gravity-based structures. Since joining ExxonMobil, he has been in charge of the structural design and engineering execution for multiple LNG tanks and LNG/NG plants and terminals, including Papua New Guinea LNG and Barzan (Qatar) NG plants. Presently, Krstulovic-Opara heads ExxonMobil’s structural research group developing high-Arctic exploration and production facilities, including definition of high-Arctic ice mechanics and the development of novel ice-resistant floating and gravity-based platforms.

Krstulovic-Opara was the Chair of ACI Committee 376, Concrete Structures for Refrigerated Liquefied Gas Containment, from 2005-2012, leading to the development and publication of the first international code for full-containment liquefied natural gas tanks. He is the current Chair of the ACI International Advisory Committee; Executive Committee Task Group on Mission-Driven International Activities; and ACI Subcommittees 376-A, Code, Education & Publication; 376-C, Analysis; and 544-E, FRC-Mechanical Properties; and Secretary of ACI Committee 544, Fiber-Reinforced Concrete.

He is a member of the ACI Technical Activities Committee (TAC); Joint ACI-ASCE Committee 446, Fracture Mechanics of Concrete; and several subcommittees of ACI Committee 376. He serves on the following Board-level committees: the Chapter Activities Committee, Convention Committee, Committee on Codes and Standards Advocacy and Outreach, Honors and Awards Committee, ISO-TC 71 Advisory Committee, and TAC Design Standards Committee. In addition, he is a member of the Executive Committee Task Group on Global Marketing, NACE Task Group, and Technical Committee Manual Task Group.

Krstulovic-Opara received his MCE (dipl.ing.) from the University of Belgrade, Serbia; his MSc from the Imperial College of Science and Technology, London, UK; and his PhD from Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA. He is a licensed professional engineer.

Antonio Nanni, FACI, is the Inaugural Senior Scholar, Professor, and Chair of the Department of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, and Professore Ordinario, Dipartimento di Strutture per l’Ingegneria e l’Architettura, Università di Napoli – Federico II, Napoli, Italy. He is also an Associate Director with the Research on Concrete Applications for Sustainable Transportation (RE-CAST) Center at Missouri S&T, Rolla, MO, and the Co-Director of the National Science Foundation (NSF) Industry/University Cooperative Research Center for the Integration of Composites into Infrastructure.

Nanni currently serves as Chair of ACI Subcommittee 562-E, Education, and is a member of the ACI Committee on Codes and Standards Advocacy and Outreach, Educational Activities Committee, Financial Advisory Committee, SP-17 Task Group, and ACI Committees 437, Strength Evaluation of Existing Concrete Structures; 440, Fiber-Reinforced Polymer Reinforcement; 549, Thin Reinforced Cementitious Products and Ferrocement; and 562, Evaluation, Repair, and Rehabilitation of Concrete Buildings. Nanni was named a Fellow of ACI in 1999. He is a recipient of ACI’s Chapter Activities Award and the Delmar L. Bloem Distinguished Service Award.

During the past 30 years, he has researched concrete and advanced composites-based systems as the principal investigator of projects sponsored by federal and state agencies and private industry. Nanni is the Editor-in-Chief of the ASCE Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering and serves on the editorial board of other technical journals. He has advised over 60 graduate students pursuing MS and PhD degrees, and published over 200 and 310 papers in refereed journals and conference proceedings, respectively, in addition to co-authoring two books. 

Nanni has received several awards, including the 2015 Engineer of the Year Award, ASCE Miami-Dade Branch; 2014 IIFC Medal, International Institute for FRP in Construction; ASCE 2012 Henry L. Michel Award for Industry Advancement of Research; and Engineering News-Record Award of Excellence in 1997 (Top 25 Newsmakers in Construction). He is a licensed professional engineer in Italy, Florida, Pennsylvania, Missouri, and Oklahoma. 

Photos of the new officers can be obtained at ACI's Media Room, or by contacting Julie Webb at Julie.Webb@concrete.org or 248-848-3148.

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For more information, contact:
Julie Webb
Marketing Communications Specialist
248-848-3148
Julie.Webb@concrete.org

Always Advancing – The American Concrete Institute is a leading authority and resource worldwide for the development and distribution of consensus-based standards and technical resources, educational programs and certifications for individuals and organizations involved in concrete design, construction and materials, who share a commitment to pursuing the best use of concrete. ACI’s inclusive, individual member-driven structure and valuable, cost-effective benefits result in an essential organization that invites partnerships and welcomes all concrete professionals who wish to be a part of a respected, connected social group that provides an opportunity for professional growth, networking and enjoyment. For additional information, visit www.concrete.org.