Intern – Getting Them Ready
We wrote this webbook for young professionals, seasoned professionals, and students in CE, CM, and ConE programs. We know too well how academia works as it relates to how difficult it can be to adopt a new textbook into the curriculum. We wrote this book to help make an impact in an area that we are so passionate about. Our goal is to encourage faculty to adopt the student edition of this webbook for the construction materials and methods course. We strongly believe that students interested in the heavy civil construction area should have access to the webbook even if the book is not adopted as a required textbook. We believe that over time, the students who have used this book will advocate for and encourage faculty to embrace it. Textbook adoption takes time in academia. Our plan “B” is to get the student edition of the webbook into the hands of every CE, CM, and ConE student (if they do not have access) by encouraging construction organizations to make it available for their interns as soon as they sign them on. Undoubtedly, those organizations could see immediate benefit if they did.
What Are The Skill Sets That Construction Organizations Advertise When Looking For Interns?
We have the data to answer this question, and here is the data gathered from construction organizations’ advertisements looking for construction students. These relate to the knowledge, skills, and abilities needed to effectively plan, execute, and control construction project outcomes.
Typical Skill Sets Internship Employers Look for
- Tracking and reporting progress
- Developing and maintaining project schedules
- Planning daily activities of the workforce
- Attending job planning meetings
- Documenting progress meetings
- Creating and maintaining detailed job logs
- Coordinating, and managing vendors
- Coordinating work with contractors
- Coordinating work with owners/client
- Coordinating and distributing information between the contracting parties
- Recording/distributing meeting minutes
- Directing and coordinating specific subcontractor’s work
- Coordinating of trades, supervision of line and grade crews
- Estimating and pricing change orders
- Calculating quantities and conducting quantity takeoffs
- Pricing items of work
- Soliciting price and quotation
- Compiling of job cost data
- Documenting good faith efforts
- Analyzing and coordinating bid
- Invoicing, progress billing, and payment
- Timekeeping
- Conducting time studies of workforce productivity
- Helping with pre-construction services (budget, bid, permit, schedule)
- Helping design teams through schematic design, design development, and construction administration
- Assisting with new site development through due diligence, feasibility studies, budgeting, and design team procurement
- Creating a design in AutoCAD or create a 3-D conceptual design to help clients visualize their landscape plan
- Helping coordinate the design process
- Overseeing permit drawing collection and permit application process
- Assisting with writing of proposal packages – SOQ, RFP
- Preparing and conducting project presentation
- Reviewing and interpreting contract plans and specification
- Creating and responding to RFIs
- Preparing and responding to submittals
- Updating technical drawings with RFI responses using AutoCAD and 3D Modeling
- Reviewing shop drawings
- Coordinating and updating as-built drawings
- Evaluating drawings for constructability
- Analyzing BIM models and use VDC techniques
- Assisting with field layout and surveys
- Document controlling
- Coordinating material fabrication and delivery
- Monitoring quantity and quality of work
- Inspecting, testing, and sampling
- Safety walks, safety inspections, and safety audits
- Attending jobsite tours
- Assist with punchlist and project close-out activities
- Tracking and managing field productivity
- Processing contract changes
- Analyzing and preparing claims
The topics that students are taught in college in construction materials and methods course should easily translate to the skill sets employers look for. That is not always the case, and it is easy to see where the gaps are when one reads some of the required textbooks that most educators use in teaching construction materials and methods course.
What Is The Current State of Practice When It Comes to How Construction Materials and Methods Course is Taught?
An in-depth review of the textbooks used in the course quickly reveals that the textbooks are written at a 30,000-foot view, and requires the students to fill the missing information. The textbooks have useful information, but they do not directly translate to some of the skill sets employers look for from an intern. We recommend and encourage students who are interested in heavy civil construction to augment those required textbooks with the student edition of our webbook.
Foundational Course
The construction materials and methods course is the foundational course students need to build their construction knowledge on, and easily tackle upper-level courses such as the cost estimating course and the project planning and scheduling course. Lack of foundational knowledge in construction materials and methods could affect a student’s internship readiness and translate to a grueling internship experience. We wrote the student edition of this webbook to get students ready. We believe that the knowledge that the students bring during their internship should translate to improved company bottom line and a return on investment. To make that happen, the students need access to real-world project-based foundational knowledge on construction materials and methods.
