Dr. Yvette E. Pearson is Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at The University of Texas at Dallas. Her university-based and consulting efforts have led to over $40M in funding to support the success of students from minoritized and marginalized identities. A Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), her work has led to changes in policies and practices to advance equity and inclusion in ASCE, ABET and other global organizations. As past chair of ASCE’s Formal Engineering Education Committee, Pearson and her team led the organization’s charge of educating programs on strategies for the inclusion of principles of sustainability in engineering curricula, in large part by promoting a transdisciplinary, convergent approach to attaining the UN Sustainable Development Goals. For the past two years, she has served on the Civil Engineering Program Criteria Task Committee, where she helped develop the currently proposed CE criteria changes.
Pearson’s awards and honors include ASCE’s Professional Practice Ethics & Leadership Award, ABET’s Claire L. Felbinger Award for Diversity & Inclusion, the Society of Women Engineers Distinguished Engineering Educator Award, and ASCE’s President’s Medal. She is a registered Professional Engineer and Commissioner on ABET’s Engineering Accreditation Commission. Her podcast, Engineering Change, has audiences in over 80 countries.
