Industry And Et Education Collaborations From A Construction Engineering Perspective

The preparation of ET graduates who can make a smooth transition from their academic training into the work force with confidence and maximum productivity in areas of education, research, and business can be achieved through well defined, carefully designed, and appropriately implemented academia-industry collaboration. The design and construction industry is one of the largest industries and a major element in shaping the economy, locally and globally. The everincreasing need for collaboration between academia and industry has never been more indispensable as it is now. The 21 st Century shall witness even more innovative applications within the construction industry that require the introduction of new building materials, equipment, and methods, as well as qualified and adequately trained personnel. The technological progress in the construction industry depends on two elements, namely: innovation and resources. Resources are introduced as MPLEM -an acronym that stands for Money, People, Land, Equipment, and Materials. Generally, academia leads most of the research and development, and industry leads the application of most academia’s findings. Inevitably, joint ventures between both result in better engineers, materials and equipment which benefit both engineering education and the construction industry. When discussing intellectual property issues, important details need to be visited such as who pays for the research work, the degree of secrecy in research, who owns the outcome, who files for a patent, who gets rights to the outcome, and what are the conditions to get those rights. Positive change comes through those who are willing to work together and take risks–and technological leadership in the construction industry is no exception. Industry’s private and public sectors, government agencies, and academia need to come together and find better ways to collaborate in working for the common cause of technology innovation and commercialization. Together, they can achieve more than if they worked apart from each other. The intelligent industry/academia collaboration through innovation will take both parties further than any of them has ever been before, or thought they can ever be. P ge 929.1 Proceedings of the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2004, American Society for Engineering Education Introduction The need for collaboration between academia and the design and construction industry (DCI) is ever increasing. The 21 st Century shall witness even more innovative applications within the design and construction industry that require the introduction of new building materials, equipment and methods, as well as qualified and well-trained personnel 1 . Important questions may be raised here, such as: Why collaborate and what are the collaboration benefits? How would we start -and then operate -a collaboration? and, What makes a collaboration successful? The discussion of these and similar questions will shed light on the process of collaboration, the benefits of collaboration, the successful collaboration programming/administration, and lessons learned. This would help those in the construction technology education and training community organizations that are interested in forming a new collaboration or in improving an existing collaboration. The remaining part of this paper is divided into the following subsections: Academia; Industry; New Materials, Processes, and Equipment; Collaboration; Academia/Industry Collaboration: Why? Intellectual Property Issues, Educational Examples of Actual Collaboration and Conclusion.