WESTERN’S CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT
STUDENTS ASSIST WITH SYLVA HABITAT HOUSE

CULLOWHEE - This time, the hands-on experience came complete with a few splinters and smashed fingernails. Students in Western Carolina University’s new construction management program got up close and personal with some of the activities they’ll one day be supervising by helping build a Habitat for Humanity house in Sylva Friday and Saturday, April 25 and 26.

The Western students were joined on Saturday by about a dozen construction management majors from Purdue University, who traveled from West Lafayette, Ind., to help drive nails, saw lumber and hoist sections of wall and roof trusses.

Bradford Sims, associate professor and director of WCU’s construction management program, said the Habitat for Humanity project gave his students the opportunity to see first-hand some of the steps involved in the construction of a house, while simultaneously providing a valuable service to the community.

“This is a good experience for these kids,” said Sims. “While some of them have worked construction for their summer jobs, some of them have never before set foot on a construction site. This gives the students a chance to get their hands dirty and to get some sawdust in their hair, and it’s not just a classroom exercise. They are actually helping to build a house that will one day be inhabited by a family that otherwise might not have been able to afford a home of their own.”

The WCU student workers began building the exterior walls on Friday. With the help of their counterparts from Purdue, they were able to complete the interior walls and erect the roof trusses by the end of the day Saturday, Sims said.

The house, one of four planned by the Jackson County chapter of Habitat for Humanity, is expected to be complete by October.

The Purdue students got involved in the project after a Thanksgiving visit to Sims’ house by Kirk Alter, who is in charge of the Purdue electrical construction program.

“Purdue’s construction engineering and management department has been involved in Habitat for Humanity projects in Indiana for several years,” said Sims, who earned his bachelor’s and doctoral degrees at Purdue, and taught there while earning his doctorate. “After talking with Kirk, we thought it would be nice to do something similar here in Western North Carolina.”

More than 40 students are currently enrolled in Western’s construction management program, which began offering courses last August. Construction management is a professional service that applies effective management techniques to the planning, design and construction of a project from beginning to end for the purpose of controlling time, cost and quality.

WCU’s first class of construction management majors will graduate in the fall of 2004. New graduates in the field can expect entry-level salaries in the $35,000 to $45,000 range and, with a national shortage of qualified construction management professionals, job placement is nearly 100 percent, Sims said.

The program is part of the department of engineering technology at Western, which also offers undergraduate degrees in electrical and computer engineering technology, engineering technology, industrial distribution, manufacturing engineering technology, and telecommunications engineering technology; a safety certificate program; and a master’s degree in technology. The department also will begin offering a joint degree program in electrical engineering with the University of North Carolina at Charlotte next year.

For more information on the construction management program at Western Carolina, contact Brad Sims at (828) 227-2175.