reflections

Michael Stremski

AE 481W/897G Course Reflection:
The AE Senior Thesis project in conjunction with the 2013 ASCE Charles Pankow Foundation Architectural Engineering Student Competition was an experience that I consider invaluable. The competition challenged our team to design and engineer the building systems for an elementary school in Reading, PA, and it was this challenge that provided us with priceless knowledge that we will take into our careers. From a structural engineering standpoint, having the opportunity to design systems "from scratch" is something that will undoubtedly help me as I begin my career as an aspiring professional engineer. The competition presented us with the chance to learn about and utilize new and innovative engineering technology into our design. It also gave our entire team more of an idea about how group dynamics work when dealing with the entire design of a building's engineering systems. Overall, entering into the ASCE Student Competition has benefited me in so many ways, and I am eager to take the knowledge gained from the competition out into the professional world.

CPEP Reflection:
Although CPEP is an extremely effective tool in creating an electronic portfolio for public view, its use was limited for our thesis due to our entry in the ASCE Charles Pankow Foundation Architectural Engineering Student Competition. Because entries into the competition were anonymous, the amount of information we were able to post during the academic year was greatly restricted. However, after submission to the competition, our team was able to utilize the CPEP site to post our reports, presentations, and other documentation to form an online portfolio for our team. Being able to share our thesis work with industry professionals is a great benefit of using the CPEP.

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