Breaking New Ground

“If you can name one thing in this room that wasn’t touched by an engineer, I’ll give you a free ride to Trinity.”

As then-prospective student Christine Keith ’11 looked around and pondered those words from Mahbub Uddin, former chair of the Department of Engineering Science, she came to a realization: Everything in the room and everything people interact with on a daily basis is some form of engineering. That was the initial spark that ignited Keith’s interest in engineering, ultimately leading her to her dream job at Thornton Tomasetti where, among other builds, she served as the project engineer for CPKC Stadium, the first soccer stadium purpose-built for a women’s professional sports team in the world.

“My maternity leave for my first son was coming to an end when the stadium was announced. Knowing that I was coming back to work and was scheduled to be on the team for a project like this made me so excited to get back to the office,” Keith shares. “Being a woman and being part of something of this magnitude for women’s sports has been a very special experience.”

Thornton Tomasetti started work on CPKC Stadium in 2021. Located at Berkley Riverfront Park on the south bank of the Missouri River in Kansas City, Missouri, the stadium opened for the Kansas City Current’s first home match of the season on March 16, 2024, which the Current won 5-4 in front of a sell-out crowd. In the stadium’s debut season, the Current became the first National Women’s Soccer League side to sell out all home matches. As a Kansas City native, Keith has been especially proud of the stadium’s success.

“Anytime you’re working on a project that you then get to see people use, it’s a pretty cool feeling,” Keith says. “The excitement and the joy that it’s brought the city is great, and the fact that the city is embracing the team so much is absolutely amazing.”

Keith’s favorite features of the 11,500-capacity stadium are the seats’ proximity to the action and the curved, undulating canopy that resembles the flow of the river it sits next to.

Growing up, Keith played sports in high school and loved math and science, but she wasn’t sure what type of career she wanted to pursue. Her parents suggested engineering would combine her math and science skill set, so she began looking at colleges with well-regarded general engineering degrees. Trinity’s engineering program, accredited by the Engineering Accreditation Commission of ABET, fit the bill, but there was just one problem.

“My brother [William Keith ’08] was already at Trinity. We went to a very small high school, so I didn’t want to follow my brother to a reasonably small college. I didn’t want to be Bill’s little sister again,” Keith says, laughing.

However, as Keith spent more time on campus, she fell in love with its location in the heart of San Antonio, the beautiful O’Neil Ford architecture, and the welcoming attitude of the people she met.

Keith roomed in the engineering living community her first year at Trinity, where she found an instant friend group and a sense of camaraderie. Academically, everything clicked for her when she took a statics course taught by Jack Leifer, Ph.D.

“I absolutely loved statics with Dr. Leifer. I would procrastinate on other homework so I could work on statics homework. That’s kind of when I knew I was in the right field,” Keith reflects.

Outside of the engineering lab, Keith explains how Trinity’s liberal arts education has made her a more well-rounded professional.

“The English classes I took gave me the foundational skills I use to write reports and explain my design concepts. I took a digital photography class my senior year and still think about some of the principles I learned in that class when I take pictures with my camera. Also, I use the experience and confidence I gained from my public speaking class fairly regularly when I give presentations,” she says.

During her sophomore year, Keith encountered a poster from the Navy advertising a career in nuclear engineering. That stuck with her, so after she graduated from Trinity, she went to Officer Candidate School in Newport, Rhode Island, before being stationed at Pearl Harbor.

Unfortunately, Lieutenant Junior Grade Keith sustained an injury to her knee that caused her to be medically separated from the Navy before she could get hands-on experience in nuclear engineering. She decided to move back home as she figured out what her next steps should be. One day while tutoring a friend in physics, he asked what her favorite class at Trinity was. Remembering how much she enjoyed Dr. Leifer’s statics class, she enrolled at the University of Kansas to further her education, earning her master’s degree in civil engineering.

As she celebrates eight years at Thornton Tomasetti, Keith reveals what keeps her excited about her work.

“I get to be challenged every day. None of my projects have been the same,” she explains. “I feel like I get to put puzzles together every day; I make the pieces fit and decide how big they need to be.”

Keith acknowledges the profound impact Trinity has had on her career. "Without Trinity, I probably wouldn’t have ended up on the path that I'm on,” she says. Her education, particularly the statics class that solidified her passion for structural engineering and the design classes where she had to work in groups that taught her to collaborate effectively, prepared her for success at Thornton Tomasetti.

Today, as she works on high-profile projects like the Las Vegas Athletics Major League Baseball Stadium that will leave their mark on cities for decades to come, Keith is deeply grateful for the support, inspiration, and opportunities she found at Trinity.

"My Trinity education has really influenced every aspect of how I think," she says. For Keith, Trinity was more than a stepping stone—it was the launching pad for a fulfilling career in engineering that continues to evolve with each new project.