Dr. Deborah Goodings, P.Eng

Department Chair and
Dewberry Chair Professor

Deborah J. Goodings joined the Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering in the Volgenau School at George Mason University in 2009 as the Dewberry Professor and CEIE Department Chairman. 

Dr. Goodings’ prior appointment was as Professor of Geotechnical Engineering in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Maryland, which she joined in 1981.  During that period, in addition to her teaching and research accomplishments, Dr. Goodings launched, with the School of Public Policy, a ground-breaking Master of Engineering and Public Policy program to educate engineers to practice in public policy.  Dr. Goodings also created and led the highly successful, award-winning University of Maryland student chapter of Engineers Without Borders.

Dr. Goodings’ experience in research, her leadership offices in the National Research Council’s Transportation Research Board and in the US Universities Council on Geotechnical Engineering and Research, and her development of non-traditional programs in engineering education, have led to her service in advisory roles in a number of organizations.  These have included academic visiting committees at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Delaware, the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and the University of British Columbia (Canada); and research advising and evaluation for the US Army Research Office, the US National Science Foundation, and the Canadian Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council.  Her career accomplishments have been recognized with awards from the Department of the Army (Outstanding Civilian Service Medal); the National Research Council’s Transportation Research Board (Fred Burggraf Award; and Emeritus Member status); the U.S. Universities Council on Geotechnical Engineering Research (Distinguished Service Award); and the University of Maryland (awards for her teaching, and for her faculty leadership of Engineers Without Borders). 

Dr. Goodings’ research in geotechnical engineering has focused most recently on extreme geotechnics (including cold regions, blasting, and extreme heat), as well as on use of sustainable materials in soil stabilization.  Her previous research has explored behavior of reinforced soil retaining walls, ground improvement through grouting, river scour, development of sinkholes, embankment dam stability, contaminant fate and transport, and soil strength characterization.  She is principally an experimentalist, using the technique of small scale geotechnical centrifuge modeling.

Dr. Goodings earned her B.A.Sc. in Civil Engineering from the University of Toronto, Canada, and her Ph.D. in Geotechnical Engineering from Cambridge University, UK. Following her Ph.D., she joined the design team for the Tarbela Dam in Pakistan with Tippetts-Abbett-McCarthy-Stratton in New York.  She is a Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers; a By-Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge University; and a registered professional engineer.