Britain Materek earned a degree in economics four years ago. But upon graduating, he realized he’d made a mistake. He’d rather be a civil engineer. Three scholarships, two honor societies and one almost-perfect grade-point average later, Materek will receive on May 17 his coveted civil engineering degree. >>

A team of NJIT engineering students received the Egor Popov Award for Structural Innovation and ranked ninth overall in the 2007 Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI) Seismic Design Competition for Undergraduates in Civil and Structural Engineering. The competition was held on Feb. 8-9 at the EERI Annual Meeting in Los Angeles. >>

Valery Nakariakov, PhD of the department of physics at the University of Warwick will discuss current trends in magnetohydrodynamic coronal seismology at a Department of Physics Seminar on Jan. 23, 4-5 p.m., Tiernan Hall Rm. 407. For more information, contact: Ravindra Nuggehalli. >>