Manmohan Joshi is a second-year Ph.D. student in Civil Engineering with a concentration in transportation and urban engineering and a new member of the 2022-2023 John Lof cohort. His research is on analyzing generated model data that can predict the severity of traffic crashes in a given area.

His passion for Engineering started when he was just a youngster in the fifth grade. That passion got him into one of the most prestigious schools in Nepal. There, he participated in a litany of projects and societies. That included fundraising for earthquake relief after the 2015 disaster and organizing student exhibitions for the Civil Engineering Student Society at the Pulchowk Campus of the Institute of Engineering.

After his Bachelor’s, he worked at a consulting firm and did his Master’s. 

“After that, there was the Center for Infrastructure Development. Their research projects were mainly about developing status papers on transportation issues, and transportation maintenance issues for the government of Nepal,” Joshi said. 

He also gained leadership experience as a lecturer at a local engineering college during his Master’s. According to Joshi, Nepal was planning to build airports haphazardly in nearby areas. His thesis hypothesized that railways would be more commercially justifiable than airports. 

His ambition was to influence policy decisions. The paper was published and he wanted to pursue a Ph.D. in transportation, but there was nothing like that at the university. 

Joshi came to UConn and finally heard about the John Lof Leadership Academy through Francesco Rouhana, the current vice president. He joined because he wanted to build up his confidence. 

“One of our first tasks was preparing and presenting a proposal for a leadership values workshop. It started to build up my confidence because, in this diverse community of students, I felt shy. However, seeing my friend speak, that motivated me,” Joshi said. 

Joshi believes that leadership is all about empathy. To him, it’s being able to bring the best goal out of a group that takes all perspectives into account.