Jaime Garza, Sen-Gin Liu and Josh Stehling (right to left), and the finished product.
2001 CSI
National Convention
Student Activities
by Jaime Garza, A/E Student at
University of Texas
It’s a beautiful day and a couple friends and I are on our way driving from Austin, Texas to Dallas, Texas. I pull out the rules, the rules to what you might ask, why to the national CSI student competition. We feel that we should get to understand the challenges that lay ahead. We come to the National Construction Specifications Institute Convention held in the great state of Texas, and my companions and I are fortunate enough to represent, if not the greatest university the largest in the nation, The University of Texas at Austin.
We three architectural engineering majors come to find out exactly what the CSI does and why they want us to be involved. Well we found CSI represented much more than the title leads one to believe. Thanks to our local Austin chapter most of the expenses for food and travel were taken care off, as well as our accommodations. A special thanks to Brian Gardner and his coordination to get us to Dallas. Any how, we arrive and find a collection of students and faculty from all parts of the nation, ready to experience and learn a whole new side of construction. First we are all introduced to the rules and regulations of the Lego- Competition, may seem a bit juvenile but, when we heard the goal of producing a working obstacle course for a marble to brave and to be built by a mass collection of Lego’s and other miscellaneous items, it seemed a bit overwhelming. Again my team and I collaborated and brainstormed on some sort of strategy to obtain the points needed to win the competition. That night honestly lead to nothing but a sense that we must make that marble make a loop de loop, fly off the track and come back, make a 180 and a 360, and of course to create an immaculate structure, but no real plan of concrete plan.
Overwhelmed with the plethora of Lego’s and miscellaneous supplies we set our minds at first to create a tall and formidable structure. We figured we could then run the marble obstacle course down the tall structure. We set to work and enjoyed every minute of it. Our marble ended up jumping the track when we were being judged, but such is life. I believe it was due to a faulty release, which in retrospect we should have specified something that fit a bit better.
Jaime Garza, Sen-Gin Liu and Josh Stehling (right to
left), and the finished product.
Besides the student competition we were able to attend the products exhibition, an overwhelming experience. From my understanding this was a specifiers heaven or nightmare come true. Windows to fit any needs, doors affordable and not so affordable, light concrete panel walls, brick, wood, and any thing else that will fit in a building. An added bonus was that these companies also sponsored the evening parties, which were a lot of fun to say the least.
CSI Student Activities Booth.
To be honest, the field trip to the American Airlines Center was the highlight of the convention. We, mostly students, were guided by the architects who wrote the specs, and were able to get a much better grasp on what the spec. writer must do, and how it may be a continual process throughout the building process.
Students tour the American Airlines Center in
Dallas.
I hope everyone realized the importance of what CSI provides to the building industry, a way to continually improve the quality of construction documents to create a clear and concise building objectives on any given project. CSI can be a media in which we bring together architects, builders, engineers, and manufactures to create efficient yet magnificent designs that may be implemented reasonably. And to leave with that understanding of CSI I believe may have been the main objective of having students attend the convention, especially the education sessions. I hope to continue my involvement as a student, and then as a professional.