Building Science Students Complete Concrete Outreach for Campus and Community

Fifty-three students from the McWhorter School of Building Science, working under the direction of Professor Michael Hein, Assoc. Professor Salman Azhar, and instructor Mike Hosey, are completing service-learning projects that involve concrete on the Auburn University campus and in the Auburn-Opelika community. Working in crews of nine, the students in the Structures for Builders III class are preparing sites and completing projects this semester that include: a pervious concrete parking slab for the Auburn Universities Fisheries lab on South College; a conventional concrete driveway and sidewalk for Habitat for Humanities in Opelika; four concrete park benches for the Auburn Forest Ecology Preserve; conventional concrete sidewalk and stairs for Cary Woods Elementary School; and a patio of porous concrete pavers for the Southeastern Raptor Rehabilitation Center.

Auburn’s Building Science program is in the forefront of educating its students about pervious concrete. For more than ten years, BSCI faculty and students have been doing research with this material and often use campus and community service projects as a way to teach and learn about it. An environmentally friendly alternative to regular concrete, pervious concrete supports load while it allows water to pass through and reduces the negative environmental effects of stormwater runoff.