AACE International is honored to be able to recognize all award winners at this year’s Conference & Expo. It is through such outstanding ability, service, and dedication displayed by our members that AACE International can continue to be the strong organization that it is. Our thanks go to you for the hard work, long hours, heartfelt involvement, and commitment to excellence that these awards symbolize. It is our great pleasure to share these awards with you and to acknowledge everything you have given to AACE. Congratulations!
AACE is pleased to recognize the following award winner:
O. T. Zimmerman Founder’s Award: Formerly the Award of Recognition, this award was created by the AACE International Board of Directors in 1995. Candidates must be a member in good standing of AACE with a minimum of ten (10) years of continuous active participation in AACE activities. The O.T. Zimmerman Founders’ Award is given in recognition of significant continuous achievement and contributions by a member at large, who has been instrumental in the development of policies, practices, procedures, and products directed to the advancement of the precepts of total cost management and AACE International. The activities of the candidate shall be in direct support of the Board of Directors, one of AACE’s associate boards, or an executive-level committee (such as the Constitution & Bylaws Committee, Ethics Committee, Fellow Admissions Committee, etc.), or other similar efforts supporting the overall functions and activities of AACE International. Membership in AACE is required.
Ghaith Al-Hiyari, CCP – A member since 2004, Ghaith became certified as a Certified Cost Professional (CCP) in 2016. He has volunteered for AACE in a variety of capacities including being an active member of the Membership Advisory Committee (2021-present). Through Ghaith’s leadership efforts, AACE implemented the Recommended Practice (RP) Spotlight webinar series. Ghaith is also an author/presenter of technical papers and webinars. He is on the board of the Toronto Section. Ghaith is an Associate Director at Turner & Townsend.
O.T. Zimmerman was Department head when I studied Chem. E. at the University of New Hampshire. He was a wonderful instructor, and the tiny classes he taught (no more than ten people) loved listening to him describe, for example, how as a kid he blew out an Eternal Flame in a Chinatown somewhere. and caused all sorts of consternation.
He knew his engineering subjects inside and out and could impart them to his students exceedingly well—even describing the workings and chemistry of petroleum refining towers.
I kept in touch with him for years, learning that he had smacked his head on ice while skating with a grandchild. He lost his sense of taste and smell as a result. Very sad.
For years ever since, I’ve told my wife and old UNH pals I would love to bring him back to see what’s happened technologically since he passed.
I KNOW he would be gob-smacked with delight over the WWW, the Internet, and how hundreds of millions of people now walk about with super-computers in their purses and pockets.
I suspect it would take a team of horses to pry him away from a modern PC.
RIP. O.T.