Martha Garcia-Saenz

• Associate Professor of Building Construction Management Technology

Martha Garcia-Saenz, B.S.C.E., M.S.C.E. is determined, intelligent and successful. Her daughter, also named Martha, is an electrical engineer; sons, Jorge and Javier, mechanical engineers; both she and her husband, Ivan, are civil engineers.  All five are Purdue University alumni. Born into a family where six generations before her were university educated, this native Colombian was eager to study civil engineering, but initially her father discouraged her. He felt engineering was a male pursuit, wanted her instead to be a nun and thought a teaching career would be better preparation. His daughter tried to persuade him by insisting that she could build schools, churches and convents! As a compromise, her father allowed her to study Mathematics and Physics. After three semesters Garcia-Saenz quietly enrolled in Civil Engineering which her parents ultimately accepted.

Martha Garcia-Saenz was the third female to receive a Civil Engineering Bachelor's degree from the Bogotá, Colombia La Gran Colombia University, recognized at the time as the best in the country by the Colombian Association of Civil Engineering Schools.

Garcia-Saenz' grandfather, Julio Cesar Garcia, and her father were philanthropists who left their fortunes to educate the Colombian
middle and lower class. Traditional universities had only daytime
classes, making higher education unavailable to working people.
Her grandfather became president of Antioquia University, Medellin, Colombia and he was responsible for its offering evening courses
for the working class. Female students were newly admitted but the
bishop considered it a sin against God and the church for women to receive college degrees. Her grandfather fought and won many
battles over this issue; the first women graduated with dental
degrees just four years after being admitted.

J.C. Garcia was president of two other universities, including Ms.
Garcia-Saenz' alma mater, La Gran Colombia University, which he
also founded in 1951. The school will soon publish a book that
includes Garcia-Saenz' research about her grandfather entitled
Julio Cesar Garcia and his Participation in the Evening Education in Colombia. While state secretary of education, he was responsible for eliminating corporal punishment in schools.

With nine friends, Garcia-Saenz' father, Henan Garcia, founded
Catholic University, precisely to educate more of the working class
in the evening.

For more than twenty years, Garcia-Saenz worked in the Colombian construction industry at all levels of management, typically being the sole female. This engineer contributed greatly to the evolving Bogotá skyline. Garcia-Saenz was the owner's engineer representative (one who represents the building owner during construction) while the 39-floor Seguros Colombia Tower, the tallest structure in Bogotá at that time, was taking shape.

Later she participated in relocating the Cudecom Building 95 feet from its original site. Taller than eight stories and weighing more than 7,000 tons, this feat was in the Guinness Book of World Records for almost thirty years as the heaviest building moved successfully.

Garcia-Saenz also was the owner's engineer representative for the construction of five skyscraper foundations between 30 and 40 stories tall. As project manager, she supervised erecting many multi-family dwellings, factories and commercial and office buildings. Prior to moving to Indiana, she was the chief project engineer for a 3,000 unit apartment complex. Located in downtown Bogotá near the presidential palace, it was the largest urban renovation project in Latin America at the end of the 80s. While working in the construction industry, Garcia-Saenz was also part-time instructor at both La Gran Colombia and Catholic Universities.

Both Martha's attended Purdue graduate school simultaneously, making them the first mother-daughter engineers to do so. When she was studying for her master's degree, Garcia-Saenz worked for an architectural firm and taught Spanish at Purdue.

After graduation and three job offers, Garcia-Saenz accepted a position at PNC in 1999 as assistant professor of Building Construction Management.  This meant a seven year long weekly commute to Michigan City from West Lafayette where her family lived, worked and attended school.  Once all the children had graduated from college, husband Ivan and wife together moved permanently to Westville.

When her students succeed and grow Garcia-Saenz feels successful herself. She is the proudest when they take her advice to further their education and when they participate in volunteer work, especially helping the handicapped or elderly.

Garcia-Saenz received the 2006 Outstanding Educator Award presented by the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB). This prize, given to educators for their voluntary extracurricular, construction industry and professional activities and experience encourages high quality standards in teaching construction courses. Not surprisingly, she was nominated by students in the PNC Construction Club “because of her knowledge, dedication, and inspiration in the construction field.”

Along with Academic Advisor Madonna Tritle, Garcia-Saenz was instrumental in establishing a PNC chapter of Women in Engineering and Technology in order to support and retain female students. She is the PNC Construction club sponsor.  She has been a speaker in the PNC Faculty Research Series and the PNC Women in Engineering and Technology program, has presented and published original refereed research papers on a variety of subjects and is president of the PNC Women's Association.

Garcia-Saenz hopes to publish a book about “Real Options,” which is defined as a stock market theory on decision making, except hers would focus on her areas of expertise, namely engineering and construction.

“I love PNC. It is my home. I love my job. People here are very special,” said Garcia-Saenz.