MIDC and MBC Students Place Third in ASC Competition

A team of Auburn graduate students from the College of Architecture, Design and Construction placed third in a design-build competition in Reno, Nev. on February 8.

The 27th Annual Student Competition hosted by the Associated Schools of Construction’s regions six and seven featured categories open nationally to all ASC schools.

“Being able to compete at the ASC competition in Reno was a unique and rewarding opportunity,” team captain Mike Jennesse said. Auburn Master of Integrated Design and Construction students Brady Lasher, Martha Merzig, Taylor Payne and Jennesse teamed up with Auburn Master of Building Construction students Jeremy George and Will Noel to enter the Integrated Project category.

Hosted by Clark Construction, the category challenged teams to provide a design-build proposal for a 483,200 square foot Superior Court building in Long Beach, California.

“This project pushed our team into understanding that initial design decisions can have substantial long term affects to the project company, so our focus was to mitigate risk through design for maintainability and operations,” Jennesse said.

The team, coached by Professor Paul Holley, had less than eighteen hours to submit a written proposal on February 6, and then they had to meet with the judges to discuss their submission the following day.

“This competition has been a great experience for our graduate students, and we are honored to compete regularly against several formidable opponents such as Stanford, USC and Cal Berkley,” Holley said. “Not only do students benefit from participating in the event, they also are exposed to completely different design and construction markets across the country. Several of our graduates who have participated in this competition over the past five years have gone on to work for a variety of large and innovative contractors from across the U.S.”

Auburn students have placed in the top three for the last four out of five years in this competition.