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Lawrence Technological University’s architectural engineering capstone team was selected as one of four finalists in the Architectural Engineering Institute’s 2024 International Student Design Competition.
The final competition was in San Jose, California on April 8-10, 2024. Other finalists included students from Penn State University, the University of Nebraska and Drexel University.
In the competition, students are asked to design a building for a specific purpose, in a specific location, and of a specific size. In this year’s competition, the team designed a Veterans Administration ambulatory care center in Omaha, Neb. The rules of the competition state that the teams submitting for the competition must include building Integration and may include any of the subdiscipline categories which are described as follows:
The LTU team participated in all five technical categories. In the national competition, they were awarded second place in the construction category.
The 11-member team received architectural renderings of the VA building at the start of the Fall 2023 semester and has been working on the project since then as part of their senior capstone project.
Team leader Mackenzie Murtha said of the competition: “For me, the most meaningful part of the competition was that the building is for our veterans, for our country. My grandfather served in the Marines, and I think it’s honorable and meaningful to work on a project that impacts the people who served our country.”
Of the national competition, she said: “The competition was a great experience and opportunity. Being able to showcase our team’s hard work over the past months and present in front of industry professionals was a moment of immense pride and honor. We were proud to represent our university and demonstrate the caliber of talent and dedication.”
Co-team leader Hunter Assenmacher said that “for me, the most fun part was the opportunity to learn in two disciplines. I’m part of the structural and mechanical teams. Structural designs the foundation, beams, columns, systems to make sure the building stands. Mechanical is HVAC, window selection and wall selection. Balancing the two has been really fun, seeing how the two integrate.”
Both Murtha, of Miami, Fla., and Assenmacher, of Ida, Mich., are fourth-year students in LTU’s five-year combined bachelor’s and master’s degree program in architectural engineering. They were joined by fourth-year students Cayd Maccognone, Olivia Fileccia, Ryan Smims, Joshua Dubin, Alex Moore, Ellery Cure, Emma Trish, and Leanne Walters as well as graduate student Marc Sessine.
Last year’s LTU AEI team was also a finalist and took home first place in the mechanical systems category and second place in the construction category.
Faculty members working with the team are Keith Kowalkowski, Deok-oh Woo, Morteza Nazari-Harris, and Ahmed Al-Bayati. Kowalkowski is assistant chair of the LTU Department of Civil and Architectural Engineering and an associate professor. Al-Bayati is an associate professor of civil and architectural engineering and director of LTU’s Construction Safety Research Center. Woo and Nazari-Harris are assistant professors of civil and architectural engineering.
Kowalkowski said “it’s a big achievement for our program and department to be a part of this design competition. It really is a great professional experience for the students to present in front of industry representatives that are experts in their respective fields and also for them to attend professional sessions as part of the Forum. The faculty is very proud of their accomplishments and wish them further success as they complete the graduate year of their degree program and of course in their professional careers”.
More about the competition at http://www.aeisdc.org/.
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