MILWAUKEE — Dr. Yong Bai, McShane Chair and Professor of Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering in the Opus College of Engineering at Marquette University, has received a $1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development for research and curriculum development of infrastructure construction and engineering.
The goal of the Training Workforce for Infrastructure Construction and Engineering (TWICE) project is to better educate future workforce with a focus on undergraduate and graduate students. Marquette researchers will collaborate with partners Milwaukee Area Technical College (MATC), the Wisconsin Regional Training Partnership | Building Industry Group Skilled Trades Employment Program (WRTP|BIG STEP) to develop educational and training materials for the existing construction and engineering workforce as well as middle and high school students.
“It is widely acknowledged that there is an increasing challenge in construction, maintenance and replacement of the American civil infrastructure, especially here in Wisconsin where much of the infrastructure requires capacity or maintenance upgrades or is reaching the end of its expected lifespan,” Bai said. “In addition, there is a growing crisis in the construction and engineering industries, which is the shortage of a skilled workforce. The current situation calls for an innovative approach that integrates research with teaching, learning, and training in infrastructure construction and engineering.”
TWICE will fund five projects related to: three-dimensional concrete printing technology for durable and affordable houses; regional assessment of public housing infrastructure resiliency to natural hazards; stormwater infrastructure inspection and training with remote sensing and deep learning; training workforce for smart work zones; and development of training materials for pavement workforce.
A larger overview of each of the five projects is available below.
“We are grateful to our partners WRTP | Big Step and MATC for their collaboration. We would also like to thank Rep. Gwen Moore for her support of this important project for our state and country,” said Dr. Kristina Ropella, Opus Dean of the Opus College of Engineering. “Safe infrastructure and skilled citizens with meaningful vocations are an important combination for successful communities, and this project addresses those needs in tandem by empowering a construction and engineering talent pipeline right here in Wisconsin.”
In addition to current and near-term workforce education, the majority of curriculum and training content developed through TWICE will be adapted for use in middle and high school learning, which will broaden the opportunities and expose underrepresented student groups to science and technology and encourage them to pursue a career in STEM.
“Baby boomers and Generation X are reaching their retirement age and, with their retirements, comes an inevitable shortage of skilled workforce. A shortage of a skilled workforce is a threat to national security,” Bai said. “This grant will sustain and expand Marquette University, WRTP|BIG STEP and MATC’s research, education and training programs for the construction industry, which is a key driving force of economic growth in the United States.”
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development administers programs that provide housing and community development assistance. HUD’s Economic Development Initiative Community Project Funding grants provide investment in a wide variety of projects such as housing, homelessness prevention, workforce training, public facilities, parks, resilience planning, and other critical infrastructure and services.
Project overviews
- Project 1 will address existing challenges with three-dimensional concrete printing technology — a technology that can reduce construction time, decrease labor costs, and minimize material waste. Current challenges include cost, durability, strength and required interruptions of the printing process. Researchers will work to overcome these challenges by exploring the standardization of the concrete mix design with local materials. Faculty researchers will develop new courses and materials for their students on 3D printing technology, which can be condensed into 30-minute training sessions for younger students.
- Project 2 will look at methodologies for regional assessment of public housing infrastructure and resiliency to natural hazards, such as earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes and flooding. The findings will be utilized to develop recommendations that enhance resiliency of new public housing construction and identify a performance-based retrofit priority for existing public housing infrastructure in various regions of the U.S. This will provide professional development training covering natural hazard risk evaluation of buildings, multi-hazard analysis and probabilistic methods and reliability analysis in building design. Outreach modules will also be created for K-12 students on introducing multi-hazard consideration in building design.
- The overarching goal of Project 3 is to overcome limitations in the monitoring and inspection of stormwater infrastructure by applying drone and satellite remote sensing with artificial intelligence and deep learning algorithms to identify maintenance needs of stormwater detention ponds. This will result in novel methods to inspect stormwater detention ponds and a trained workforce in the construction and engineering industry through a graduate student who is trained in both traditional and remote sensing inspection of stormwater infrastructure. Middle and high school students will also benefit from training materials for participation in an outreach workshop.
- Project 4 will develop training materials for the workforce in Smart Work Zones — work zones on roadways where data and sensors from phone GPS and connected vehicles are employed to improve safety and operations. This project will include training videos and presentations developed through collaboration with industry organizations and transportation agencies. These materials will also be adapted into a session guide for a 30-minute STEM outreach project aimed at middle or high school students designed to introduce students to work zone management topics in a hands-on setting that will also serve them well as new drivers and navigators of the transportation space.
- Project 5 is dedicated to the development of training materials for pavement workforce designed to fill the gap between the state of the knowledge and the state of the practice. Through collaboration with industry organizations and transportation agencies, training materials will be developed for 150 minutes of presentations to be broken into short segments. A simplified version will be used for outreach to middle and high school students.
About Marquette University
Marquette University is a Catholic, Jesuit university located near the heart of downtown Milwaukee that offers a comprehensive range of majors in 11 nationally and internationally recognized colleges and schools. Through the formation of hearts and minds, Marquette prepares our 11,100 undergraduate, graduate, doctoral and professional students to lead, excel and serve as agents of positive change. And, we deliver results. Ranked in the top 20% of national universities, Marquette is recognized for its undergraduate teaching, innovation and career preparation as the sixth-best university in the country for job placement. Our focus on student success and immersive, personalized learning experiences encourages students to think critically and engage with the world around them. When students graduate with a Marquette degree, they are truly prepared and called to Be The Difference.
