Randy Chu

University of Hawaii Civil Engineering, Class of 1981 (BS), 1983 (MS)

Like many of you, I too was a former student of Professor Arthur Chiu. During the 3 + years I served as Professor Chiu’s Research Assistant in the early 1980’s, I was fortunate to get to know Arthur Chiu as a teacher, mentor, and family friend.

I would like to share with you a little of the Professor Chiu I knew, based on the many hours I spent with him.

It is common knowledge that Arthur was hard working and dedicated to his profession. It was normal for Professor Chiu to be in his office seven days a week, ten to twelve hours a day. While in the office, Professor Chiu would spend his time preparing for the classes he taught, grading papers, writing research grant applications, performing wind engineering research, writing technical papers, reviewing research performed by his colleagues, preparing for his national and international meetings, and meeting with his students who needed help.

As a teacher, Arthur strongly believed that exam problems should never be used more than once. Therefore, he made new exam problems for each and every class he taught. Based on the more than 40 years that he taught at the University of Hawaii…that is a lot of problems. As an exam preparation tool for his students, Professor Chiu compiled copies of all past exams from all his past classes that he taught and kept it at Sinclair Library for his students to view.

Professor Chiu was a strict but compassionate instructor. In his earlier teaching years, he would stamp on his student’s homework “IMPROVE PRINTING” if he thought your penmanship was not up to engineering standards. Fortunately for many of us, he discontinued using that rubber stamp in the 1970’s.

If you took one of Professor Chiu’s classes, you could count on having two or more mid-term exams and one final exam. If, after grading the first mid-term exam, Professor Chiu felt a student was having trouble understanding the class material, he would stamp “SEE ME” on the student’s exam paper. This measure was not to scare the student, rather it was done because Professor Chiu really was concerned and wanted each and every student to learn the material. If you had “SEE ME” stamped on both your first and second mid-term exams… well, lets say… you might consider dropping the class! I had a “SEE ME” on one of my papers…

Arthur Chiu demanded excellence from himself and wanted to teach that virtue to his students in preparation for them becoming engineers. Therefore, if you did, in his opinion, “excellent” work in his class, you would receive a virtuous “A” grade.

Arthur Chiu was highly respected for his research and knowledge in the field of wind engineering both nationally and internationally. His research took him to Japan, China, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, India, Korea, Australia and various parts of Europe to work with his fellow researchers. It was very common for Professor Chiu to be on a trip twelve or more times a year to perform joint research with his international colleagues, attend workshops, or present technical papers.

Outside of his professional work, Arthur was a good husband, father, and grandfather. …and he even found the time to keep his yard well manicured. I often wondered when he had the time to sleep!

Arthur Chiu accomplished more in his lifetime than most people could do in two. He has forever advanced the science of Wind Engineering, attained all achievements a Professor and Engineer could desire, and have received practically all awards any person in his profession could possibly receive. Arthur has taught, inspired, and shaped the professional careers of literally thousands of engineering students, who today are the leaders in their profession. He has been a good husband, father, grandfather, mentor and friend.

I feel blessed to have known Dr. Arthur Chiu for he has truly made me a better person.