A junior engineering student has received a scholarship from the Middle Tennessee chapter of the American Society of Highway Engineers.
Leslie Labruto, a civil and environmental engineering major, was awarded a $1,000 ASHE scholarship for spring semester. Greg Duncan, ASHE chapter president and Tennessee Department of Transportation Director of Maintenance, and Jon Storey, chapter Scholarship Chairman and project manager at Florence & Hutcheson, presented a check today to Labruto.
The scholarships under this ASHE program are available to students seeking a career in the highway industry. College or technical school students who are studying highway industry related subjects at a Tennessee college or technical school are eligible.
Labruto is president of Students Promoting Environmental Awareness and Responsibility (SPEAR), and she is active in the Vanderbilt University chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers. She is a VUceptor and serves on the Appellate Review Board. She is the Nichols Humanitarian Fund Scholar for 2009 and she was nominated to receive the Outstanding Community Servant Award.
At the end of her freshman year, Labruto returned home to New Jersey and created her own summer internship at a local engineering firm. She helped the firm prepare a bid for a $200 million project reconstructing routes 1 and 9 near the Pulaski Skyway in Jersey City, the largest project in New Jersey DOT history. The firm won the contract and she has been asked to return to the firm during school breaks.
Two other Tennessee students received ASHE scholarships. They are Mathew Lindval, East Tennessee State University, and Stephen Durham, Middle Tennessee State University.