Overview

The project involves Civil Engineering students from Coventry University and Architectural Project Management from Ryerson University, Toronto, working as a virtual team to design a new building for the School of Energy, Construction and Environment.

Teams work together designing in ‘real’ time by using ‘Go-to-meeting’. The project runs over one semester with 2 stages. Stage 1 concentrates on the design process from a architectural and civil Engineering perspective. Stage 2 focuses on producing tender documentation to support the design proposal.

At the end of the project the groups have to present their proposals, competing against each other.

Learning Outcomes

1. Demonstrate the capacity to apply international standards and practices within the discipline or professional area.
2. Demonstrate a range of visual and verbal communication skills, with a range of professionals in response to a given client brief.
3. Demonstrate group integration, across diverse construction professions, knowledge and skills, for a major scenario-based project, within a design and construction environment.
4. Demonstrate a critical approach to study skills through international teamwork and continuous personal improvement.
5. Demonstrate good professional practice as a reflective and conscientious student.

Sequence of Activities

SEPT
Task 1 Launch of Assignment
The ‘New Building for School of Energy, Construction and Environment’ assignment brief is communication to students.
Group formation between students is facilitated by online meetings and discussion forums for selecting optimal partnerships with complementary skills.

OCT – DEC
Task 2 Design Process
Students collaborate on project to submit one group design and report. Expected group outputs include: video recording of group meetings using Go-To-Meeting software, creation of the team charter, project design report and evaluation.

Student outputs

Design submission – see examples below.

• Group 3: Resonance Architecture & Engineering Services (Florence Ma, Caeleigh Kinch, Safiyya Sanusi & Alla Bolton). Download poster (6.3 MB PDF file)
• Group 4: Blue Print (Concepts Amanda Zuliani, Carol Nguyen, Ramadan Nuhu & Yann Steve). Download poster (7.9 MB PDF file)
• Group 5: JAKS (James Bruce Webb, Alessia Commisso, Scott Hodge & Kevin Bilics). Download poster (8 MB PDF file)
• Group 7: CRI Arquitecture (Jaiwook Lee, Minh Tran, Shamshir Ahmed & Serge Bou Sleiman). Download poster (12 MB PDF file)

Publications

• Soetanto, R., Childs, M., Poh, P., Austin, S. and Hao, J. (2012) Global Multidisciplinary Learning in Construction Education: Lessons from Virtual Collaboration of Building Design Teams. In: Civil Engineering Dimension, Vol. 14, No. 3, December 2012 (Special Edition), 173-181
• Soetanto, R., Childs, M., Poh, P., Austin, S. and Hao, J. (2014) Virtual collaborative learning for building design. ICE Proceedings, Management Procurement and Law, Vol 167, Issue 1
• Soetanto, R., Childs, M., Poh, P., Austin, S., Glass, J., Adamu, Z., Isiadinso, C., Tolley, H. and MacKenzie, H. (2015) Key success factors and guidance for international collaborative design project, International Journal of Architectural Research.

Conference presentations

• Austin S. and Soetanto R., (2012) International student integrated project work using virtual teams comprised of students from the United Kingdom and Canada. In: EE2012 – Innovation, Practice and Research in Engineering Education. Loughborough University Press, 54
• Soetanto R., Poh P., Austin S., Jane Hao J. and Katsanis C. (2012) Communication modes and performance of virtual design teams in an undergraduate building project. In: Smith, S.D. ed. ARCOM 28^th annual conference: Our Dynamic Earth. ARCOM, Association of Researchers in Construction Management, 26
• Poh, P., Soetanto, R., Austin, S. and Adamu, Z. (2014) international Multidisciplinary learning: An account of a collaborative effort among three Higher Education Institutions. In: 8th International Conference on e-Learning 2014. Lisbon, Portugal
• Childs, M., Austin, S., Soetanto, R., Glass, J., Adamu, Z., Isiadinso, C., Poh, P., Knyazev, D., Tolley, H. and MacKenzie, H. (2014) Virtual collaboration in the built environment. European Distance and E-learning Network (EDEN) Annual Conference, 10-13 June, Zagrb, Croatia.