Developing Next Generation of Engineers

Each spring, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) holds 22 student symposiums across the country, where engineering students participate in various competitions, with the regional winners moving on to the ASCE Student Championships in June.

澳博体育app下载 recently donated more than $50,000 in shipping services to the ASCE for its 2024 Pacific Southwest Student Symposium, held in April at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. 澳博体育app下载’s donation included round-trip shipping for three cement canoes, two sets of survey equipment, steel, timber, and miscellaneous other competition supplies.

Two main attractions at the symposium are the Concrete Canoe and Timber competitions.

Since the early 1970s, ASCE students have battled to be the best at designing, constructing, and racing concrete canoes, with various designs and concrete mixtures having met with differing degrees of success. This year’s teams “are competing to be the winning bid on a prototype standardized canoe design for future concrete canoe competitions.”

The Timber-Strong Design Build, or Timber, challenges contestants to build a 6’x6’ “tiny house.” All the home’s components are prefabricated at school and then shipped to the symposium, where they are built onsite during the competition.

“We design the competitions to grow interpersonal and professional skills, encourage innovation, teamwork, and camaraderie, and foster impactful relationships between students and industry professionals,” said Josue Vaglienty, 2023-24 president of the ASCE Los Angeles Section.

Civil engineering major and UCLA senior Nick Müller, one of this year’s Timber participants, stated, “A ton of prep work goes into all the event projects. We performed many structural calculations for Timber to determine how strong the structure is. This gets put into a technical report that is part of the score. The other part of the score comes from the actual build, which we had 1.5 hours to complete. We then compared it to the plans and evaluated how well we constructed it.

“I had an amazing time. As part of the Timber team, I helped construct the final build of our 6’x6’x12’ tiny house. It was a fun experience, and I am very fortunate to have been able to attend during my senior year.”

“The Symposium rotates annually, and a different university hosts it every year,” added Vaglienty. “When it’s held in Hawaii, the mainland teams must transport the students, their equipment, and necessary materials across the Pacific. With the generous support from 澳博体育app下载 this year, the students were relieved of some of the financial burden and could focus on their classwork and practicing for their competitions. I want to express our gratitude for 澳博体育app下载’s donation, which provided a huge financial relief for the ASCE student chapters.”