Sarah (Holtz) Wilson

Sarah (Holtz) Wilson
BS, Civil Engineering, 1998
Principal Tunnel Engineer and Vice President for Construction Management at McMillen Jacobs Associates

Sarah Wilson

Sarah Wilson is a Principal Tunnel Engineer and Vice President for Construction Management with McMillen Jacobs Associates (MJ) in San Francisco, where she has worked for over 22 years. Ms. Wilson’s leadership experience and technical expertise stem from design roles on transit projects, dam and water conveyance facilities, and construction management roles on numerous underground contracts in both soft ground and rock. Her experience includes projects in Puerto Rico, Massachusetts, Washington, D.C., New York, Georgia, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, and Vancouver. She is a CMAA-certified construction manager and a registered professional civil engineer in California. Ms. Wilson was featured in Drexel’s “40 under 40” list in 2015 and serves on the Drexel Engineering Alumni Industry Board. She earned her MS in Geotechnical Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley. She believes in the accessibility of engineering education and speaks regularly at universities and high schools, including recent participation in the development and teaching of a Colorado School of Mines course on Underground Construction Management and serving on Teach the Professors Committee to bring underground education to civil engineering students. Ms. Wilson edited the Second Edition of Recommended Contract Practices for Underground Construction, which was published by the Underground Construction Association of the Society for Mining, Metallurgy, and Exploration (UCA of SME) in 2019. She is a participant in the ASCE Legislative Fly-In for 2022 to serve as an educator and advocate for infrastructure improvements. For the past twelve years, she has served on a number of firm and industry committees and boards, including two years as President of the American Rock Mechanics Association (ARMA) and two years as Board Chair for MJ. She is currently serving on the UCA of SME’s Executive Committee and the ARMA Diversity, Equity and Inclusion task force. In 2019–2020, she served as Project Lead for a pedestrian bridge the firm built in partnership with Bridges to Prosperity in Uganda.