The end....!

We are in the last week of the project now, Lucian finished 2 weeks ago and I am continuing with the project which mainly involves pulling together all of the work we have done over the summer so that these projects can run smoothly through this coming academic year. 

We have finished scoping projects now and so no further meetings were necessary last week or this week. As well as scoping the projects we have also had to find academics to supervise all of the projects and draw up an agreement document between the students and community partners.  My main concern at the moment is the fact that we do not have supervisors for all the projects yet, and without a supervisor the project cannot run. As I finish at the end of this week, we had a meeting yesterday to discuss what stage the project was at, so any outstanding work needing to be done could be handed over to others who are continuing to work on the project. 

At the beginning of the project our aim was to scope around three third year research projects, but we have actually managed to scope six third year research projects and five fourth year design projects as well as having contacts and project ideas for five potential future projects. So all in all the work we have been doing over the summer has been a great success. Furthermore we have passed on ideas for projects to both the mechanical engineering and engineering design departments at the university.  

It will be interesting to see if these projects are successful in their development throughout the year, and whether it is easy for them to continue to run in future years, and spread across other departments. Personally I am very attracted to the community based learning projects as they are an exciting new opportunity which present the chance to gain new skills that might not be gained from lab or desk-based projects. 

Nearing the finish line...

We’ve realised that the weeks are starting to run out and we still have plenty of work to do. Caroline has taken 3 weeks holiday which started from the end of week 5. I have continued to work.

It has been very easy for me to work on my own. I have felt confident arranging and going to meetings by myself or with an academic. The main bit of work to do was getting the project list sent out to the academic staff from the Civil Engineering department and now it’s a waiting for game for supervisors to sign up.

We have completed a list of projects with various organisations;

DJDH architects – Myrtle Triangle
- What underlies the land; Malago interceptor, abandoned coal mines etc.
- Heat extraction technique
- ‘Eco-village’

Southville Community Centre
- Traffic re-routing

Sustainability Unit – University of Bristol
- Monitoring energy usage across the university, in particular monitoring fume cupboard efficiency
- Ways to reduce energy usage and increase the efficiency of fume cupboards

Forum for the Future
- New site developments
- Creation of sustainable urban drainage schemes
- Interdependencies of infrastructure in the area

Bristol City Council
- Incorporating sustainable technologies onto Council buildings, old and odd shaped

Low Carbon Southwest
- Thermal Energy Grid

Hamilton House
- Sustainable techniques

Windmill Hill City Farm
- Considering the sustainable options for an independent community centre located on an urban site

Each project has one academic supervisor. When we started this placement we didn’t really think about each project needing a supervisor. Supervisors usually set up projects on the back of their own research so making them want to sign up to our projects will be a challenge but one we are hoping they will do. We need to make the projects sound attractive enough to them.

What happens to the projects that we have set up but can’t run as we don’t have a supervisor??

This isn’t a short term project by the University. They want to incorporate community based projects across the other departments and for many years. This improves the University’s relationship with the various communities but also gives the students many extra skills that they wouldn’t have got if they were doing the ‘standard’ projects. Our placement gives the University a contact list that they can approach in the future to set up more projects. Some of the projects we have set up won’t only be a one year project. There is potential for some to be a 3^rd year this coming year and 4^th year the following year.

The list we have compiled is a mixture of 3^rd and 4^th year projects. We have found that many of the projects would be better suited being design projects and this seems to be preferred by the supervisors as it means that the project has actual design outcomes. This I believe will also be preferred by the community partners.

What has started out as ‘try and set up 5-6 Community projects for 3^rd year Civil students’ has turned into a list of 10 projects that we hope to definitely run this year; 6 3^rd year, 4 4^th year, 3 projects that we have as potential future projects and some ideas for projects that we can send to other engineering departments. The fact that we have 10 projects is great, very happy. Everyone who we contacted has been very helpful, very willing to help us with what we are trying to achieve. If they themselves did not have any ideas of projects they would give us the details of those who may have some ideas. At the start I was worried about who were going to approach, how would we know where to start? We were given a few contact details by Philippa and it all kicked off from there and rapidly gained momentum.

The challenge now is to get supervisors on board and finalise the projects.

Any thoughts, advice and guidance would be very welcome!

Meetings, meetings and more meetings....

If there was one word that summarised the past few weeks for us it would be meetings; first with the Centre for Public Engagement who are overseeing our project, then with a wide range of potential community partners and university staff. 

During the first week we spent a lot of time with the Southville Community Centre  trying to scope out what potential projects could be delivered within the community, and trying to ensure that these also had engineering outcomes.  We found that everyone we contacted was very helpful and provided us with even more ideas and contacts!

At the moment the project is really starting to gain some momentum. There are a range of example projects beginning to emerge including:

·         Sustainability Unit – University of Bristol

-          Monitoring energy usage across the university, in particular monitoring fume cupboard efficiency

-          Ways to reduce energy usage and increase the efficiency of fume cupboards

·         Windmill Hill City Farm

-          Considering the sustainable options for an independent community centre located on an urban site

·         Forum for the Future – Temple Gateway Redevelopment

-          New site developments

-          Creation of sustainable urban drainage schemes

-          Interdependencies of infrastructure in the area

·         Southville Community Centre

-          Traffic re-routing

-          Improving current sustainable techniques

We have a further meeting next week with an architect who is a resident of the ‘Myrtle triangle’, who has an idea of trying to tap energy from the Malago Interceptor which runs underneath the ‘Myrtle triangle’. This is an individual’s idea who has no particular expertise in this field and so the students would be required to see if this is possible, feasible and worthwhile.

One of the difficulties we have encountered is the distinction between a research project (where students investigate and solve a technical problem) and a design project (where students develop a conceptual and detailed solution for a project).  We have found that many of the initial projects we scoped are in fact more suitable for design projects as opposed to research projects. Furthermore we have experienced difficulty in finding community partners happy to offer a research project from which they will not receive any design or implementation. The main question at this stage is whether a project can be passed on to the following year group without having to repeat this process again next summer. One idea is that 3^rd years complete an evaluation / project brief for the next year’s students on completion of their project.

Finally, any thoughts, advice and guidance would be very welcome!

Introduction to the project

We are civil engineering students from the University of Bristol and have just completed our 2^nd year of a 4 year Masters degree in Civil Engineering. We are working with the University this summer to scope potential community based engineering projects that the 3^rd year students can undertake as their major research projects.

Community based learning can be described as the process by which students apply what they are learning to community problems, at the same time as reflecting upon their experience to gain a deeper understanding and to achieve real objectives for the community.

We would be looking to find up to 3 placements for pairs of students, and the projects would need to have both community and engineering outcomes. This blog will follow the ups and downs of the first stages of the project as we embark on our mission to help create links between the academic applications of civil engineering and the needs of the local community.

Formalising

Just working through the objectives for the interns - seems like there is a lot to do and we only have 5 weeks left. Better to have thought the project through, though (if there is such a thing) than just to cross fingers and hope that we get it all done.

There is a fine balance between getting the outputs done - the project briefs etc - and attending to the process, which has the possibility of being a much richer learning experience. There's also the challenge for the students (I imagine) of lots of different 'bosses' with different ideas of what's important - from mind maps to blogs to project narratives and checklists. The temptation could be to produce lots of written material that doesn't get used, maybe missing some of the essentials that are going to make the projects work - clear collaboration agreements etc.

Lots to do!