Student Spark Story

Emily Chien

Junior Engineer
San Francisco Public Utilities Commission
Ignited Teacher – Jonathan Montoya, CTE Department Chair

Student Spark Story

Growing up surrounded by the tech careers of Silicon Valley, Emily Chien first heard of civil engineering as a senior at Piedmont Hills High School. Drawn to this tangible field, where “you can build something on a piece of paper or computer and then go outside and see it come to life, with the potential to impact people,” Emily now works as a junior engineer at the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC).

Emily’s high school mentor Ryan Lundell introduced her to civil engineering through a year-long project he co-developed with Ignited alum Jonathan Montoya. Informed by Ignited’s 2022 Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Week, Jonathan and Ryan refined the immersive, project-based curriculum they had designed, letting students take the lead with teachers guiding from the sidelines.

Emily’s year-long project to design a tiny home community for the Bay Area’s homeless population involved surveying land in San Jose and interviewing representatives from a local service organization. Each of the five students in her group managed a specific aspect, requiring strong communication and timely delivery – especially as the project coincided with the pandemic’s onset.

“It was the first time I did something that was so open ended,” Emily reflects. “It wasn’t ‘fill out this worksheet and there’s only one correct answer.’ It motivated me to be more invested because the project was what I made of it.” Looking back on how intimidating it was to interview professionals who were 15 years her senior, Emily says: “These kinds of skills are not always taught in the classroom, but they’re very beneficial to practice before you get into the workforce.”

Jonathan and Ryan’s curriculum culminated in a final student presentation at Stanford University to stakeholders. In addition to learning how to present a compelling story around her final product, Emily met actual civil engineers for the first time and saw it as a career path she might pursue. “These were not the types of people I normally interacted with in my daily life; most people I know work in tech or want to become software engineers.” 

Later, when exploring majors at UC Berkeley, she recognized civil engineering as the perfect fit. Throughout college, Emily continued her experiences in the field through internships with San Francisco Public Works, a construction company, and a geotechnical engineering firm doing quality control for a landfill project in Stockton.

After graduating, Emily secured an internship with SFPUC’s Engineering Management Bureau, supporting large scale pipelines delivering water from Hetch Hetchy in Yosemite to San Francisco, which led to her full-time role as a junior engineer designing water projects in the City Distribution Division. “I think it’s interesting to serve the public, and water is vital for every community. Everybody needs to have their waste safely removed from their home. Everybody needs water.”