Western Michigan University Dr. Osama Abudavyeh
This proposal seeks a NSF Research Experiences for Undergraduates site in the Department of Construction Engineering, Materials Engineering, and Industrial Design at Western Michigan University. The site will be focused on the Construction Engineering and Management that is a relatively new discipline that has emerged from the growing demands on the construction profession. This undergraduate research experience is designed to provide students with an improved understanding of research and to encourage them to consider graduate studies and research in the Construction Engineering and Management area. Components of the program include identification of exceptional students through nationwide recruitment with emphasis on women and minority participation; matching student interests with faculty; close interaction of graduate students and faculty with the REU participants to provide students with a fuller appreciation of graduate study, university research, and careers in academia; an intense two-month research experience; a short course in construction engineering and management to facilitate effectiveness in the research projects; an ethics workshop; an evaluation program; and a cohort of other related professional and social activities.
The key distinctive elements of our approach are: (1) to present each participant with several possible project topics, so that they can feel they have chosen a project which is most interesting to them, (2) to immerse the participants in the general research environment essentially as if they were graduate students, by having them meet with the faculty member once each week to discuss their project, participate in the weekly research group meetings, attend research presentations and meet with visiting researchers, and (3) to participate in an array of professional activities such as spending time on real construction projects to experience the dynamics of the construction environment, visiting owner organization to learn more about contract administration issues and processes, participate in an ethics workshop to learn more about professional ethical issues and dilemmas, and learn to assimilate the latest research from reading and discussing recent papers, and learn how to write up and present the results of their own research.
