Teaching is an essential and noble profession that educates and trains people to acquire the skills and expertise necessary for succeeding in a particular field. Teachers are integral to society because they nurture students and future leaders by imparting essential knowledge, wisdom, and skills. Teachers are also vital for advancing a profession and discipline by inspiring and motivating people to discover and develop new concepts, theories, and frameworks through research. Pedagogy and teachers are also crucial for engineering because they help future engineers understand the fundamental concepts behind professional practices or fieldwork. Students acquire wisdom and knowledge from their teachers before gaining experience in the field as professionals. The knowledge obtained from teachers during education provides a foundation for developing skills and working efficiently.
Education is also crucial for structural and earthquake engineering because it plays a vital role in equipping students with the knowledge and expertise to strengthen structures and prevent damage to buildings from earthquakes. Civil engineering students should have adequate knowledge and awareness of designing and maintaining construction projects safely and efficiently. Training and education also enable civil engineering students to obtain and improve information about the role and effects of various materials in construction projects. Teachers are vital in the civil engineering discipline because they help students learn the primary concepts and rules required for completing construction projects safely while ensuring that the structures withstand the test of time. Sekhar Chandra Dutta is a prominent and experienced teacher in the civil engineering field, helping students excel in the structural and earthquake engineering fields as professionals.
Sekhar Chandra Dutta is a civil engineer, research scholar, and teacher with experience of over 27 years. Dutta completed his bachelor’s in engineering (B.E.) from the University of Calcutta, Kolkata, in 1988 and a master’s in engineering (M.E.) from the same university in 1990. He completed his doctorate in civil engineering with a focus on structural engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, in 1996. Dutta published over 120 research papers in scholarly journals during his career, including two journals during his education in 1992 and 1995. He published an article with S. Dasgupta in the Bridge and Structural Engineers Journal in 1992 entitled the Dynamic Analysis of Multistoried Building Frame with Elastic and Elastoplastic Behavior – Using Simplified Model. Dutta also published an article on the Hysteresis Models for the Nonlinear Behavior of RC Members in the Asian Journal of Civil Engineering in 1995.
Structural and earthquake engineering education helps students understand how to reinforce structures or buildings and increase their endurance or resistance against earthquakes and other natural disasters. Dutta contributed significantly to the field by applying his scholarly knowledge and experience to teach the basics of civil and structural engineering. He started his career in 1995 as a civil engineering lecturer at the Indian Institute of Engineering Science and Technology (IIES), formerly Bengal Engineering (B.E.) College, Shibpur, India. He later rose to the position of assistant professor of applied mechanics in the college before joining the Bengal Engineering and Science University in 2004 as a professor of civil engineering.
Dutta established the School of Infrastructure at the Bhubaneswar campus of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) and became its founding head in 2009. He served as the head of the institute until 2010 and again from 2012 to 2014. Dutta was also the students’ affairs dean/PIC at IIT from 2009 to 2010 and dean of continuing education from 2011 to 2013. He also served as alum affairs and international relations dean from 2011 to 2014. Sekhar Dutta was a visiting Fulbright Nehru Senior Research Fellow at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of California, Davis, from 2010 to 2011. Dutta worked with renowned civil engineering professor Sashi K. Kunnath at the University of California. He was the professor and head of the Civil Engineering Department at the Indian School of Mines on the Dhanbad campus of IIT from 2015 to 2017. Dutta also served as a guest faculty member at the University of Windsor in Canada during the summer of 2015.
Education and training go a long way in advancing any discipline and field of study because teachers provide students with the necessary skills and expertise to excel professionally. Sekhar Chandra Dutta is also an experienced civil engineer and career professor, educating and training future minds in the structural and earthquake engineering fields. Dutta served in various teaching capacities throughout his career while participating in numerous research studies. His teaching and research contributions also earned him several awards and accolades, including being included in the top two percent of the global scientists’ list developed by Stanford University in 2021.
