With a background in structural engineering, Ilham Munawar Siddiq is studying civil engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology.

He is a research assistant and the secretary of science communication at Tsunami and Disaster Mitigation Research Center in Banda Aceh.

He received a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Muhammadiyah Aceh University and the second one in English teaching from Ar-Raniry State Islamic University.

After gaining his master’s in the US, Ilham plans to continue work at the research center and help design cost-effective retrofitting solutions for the many poorly built structures in post-tsunami Aceh.