Rubaya Rahat, Claudia Calle Müller and Mohamed ElZomor
While the efforts at the curriculum level to promote sustainability and resilience have been increasing, it is critical to determine effective approaches to advance the awareness…
Abstract
Purpose
While the efforts at the curriculum level to promote sustainability and resilience have been increasing, it is critical to determine effective approaches to advance the awareness of social equity of the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) students in such a context. This study aims to explore AEC students’ awareness and perception of societal inequalities within resilient infrastructure systems and investigate the efficacy of a training approach to cultivate concepts related to sustainable, equitable and resilient infrastructure (SERI).
Design/methodology/approach
The study surveyed AEC students and gathered data about students’ awareness of equity in resilient infrastructure systems, their desire to promote systemic change and relevant demographics. Furthermore, the study implemented training within a sustainability course and conducted a post-training survey.
Findings
The results revealed that although the majority of the students demonstrated a promising level of awareness, some students lacked knowledge related to infrastructure inequity issues. In addition, the findings indicated that guided training could improve the students’ understanding as well as boost their confidence to address and mitigate infrastructure inequity issues in resilient infrastructure development.
Originality/value
The findings of the study are valuable for increasing awareness of infrastructure equity and can motivate educators to develop targeted strategies and educational modules, ensuring that AEC students possess the essential knowledge and perspectives to develop equitable, sustainable and resilient infrastructures.
Details
Keywords
Rubaya Rahat, Piyush Pradhananga and Mohamed ElZomor
With the increasing demand for sustainable developments, higher education should focus on teaching both sustainable buildings and infrastructure systems. This study aims to…
Abstract
Purpose
With the increasing demand for sustainable developments, higher education should focus on teaching both sustainable buildings and infrastructure systems. This study aims to investigate the existing sustainable infrastructure (SI) teaching efforts in sustainability courses; identify best practices to integrate SI throughout bachelor’s and master’s programs under the construction management (CM) curricula; and propose guidelines for students to obtain Envision sustainability professional (ENV SP) credential during sustainability education.
Design/methodology/approach
This study conducted keywords search within the sustainability course descriptions under the American Council for Construction Education accredited CM curricula to locate SI topics. Additionally, this research collected inputs from the Envision Academic Committee members to develop a matrix representing the best practices for integrating SI in higher education and provided a guide with a step-by-step procedure to obtain ENV SP credentials.
Findings
This study identified a gap regarding the availability of SI education and offered best practices on how CM curricula might nurture such knowledge. Phase I highlighted that only two CM programs taught infrastructure sustainability, and three programs offered sustainability credentialing processes under a bachelor’s degree. Phase II developed a framework that offered a variety of pedagogical approaches and outlined the process for obtaining the ENV SP certificate for CM students in the freshman, sophomore, junior and senior years.
Originality/value
The findings of this study can facilitate CM education to create awareness among the future workforce and encourage them to establish skills pertaining to the economic, social and environmental implications while designing SI.
Details
Keywords
Rubaya Rahat, Claudia Calle Müller and Mohamed ElZomor
Construction education rarely addressed the importance of disseminating knowledge on infrastructure equity, thus impeding progress toward creating equitable and sustainable…
Abstract
Purpose
Construction education rarely addressed the importance of disseminating knowledge on infrastructure equity, thus impeding progress toward creating equitable and sustainable developments. This study aims to investigate the existing sustainability courses under the American Council for Construction Education (ACCE) accredited construction management (CM) programs to examine the integration of infrastructure equity topics and assess improvement in CM students’ knowledge and awareness to address this issue through an intervention.
Design/methodology/approach
To achieve these objectives, this research reviewed the sustainability course descriptions of the ACCE-accredited undergraduate and graduate CM curricula. Furthermore, the study implemented a workshop within a CM sustainability course that taught the students about the key concepts of infrastructure equity as well as how to address this issue by leveraging the Envision infrastructure rating system.
Findings
The course review results showed that most sustainability courses lack topics such as infrastructure equity and social sustainability. Moreover, the analysis of pre- and postworkshop surveys indicated that guided training could improve the students’ understanding as well as boost their confidence to address and mitigate infrastructure inequity issues.
Originality/value
The findings of the study are valuable for increasing awareness of infrastructure equity and facilitating the future construction workforce with the required expertise to develop equitable infrastructure systems.
Details
Keywords
Rubaya Rahat, Piyush Pradhananga and Mohamed ElZomor
Safe-to-fail (SF) is an emerging resilient design approach that has the potential to minimize the severity of flood damages. The purpose of this study is to explore the SF design…
Abstract
Purpose
Safe-to-fail (SF) is an emerging resilient design approach that has the potential to minimize the severity of flood damages. The purpose of this study is to explore the SF design strategies to reduce flood disaster damages in US coastal cities. Therefore, this study addresses two research questions: identifying the most suitable SF criteria and flood solution alternatives for coastal cities from industry professionals’ perspective; and investigating the controlling factors that influence the AEC students’ interest to learn about SF concepts through the curricula.
Design/methodology/approach
This study used the analytical hierarchy process to evaluate the SF criteria and flood solutions where data were collected through surveying 29 Department of Transportation professionals from different states. In addition, the study adopted a quantitative methodology by surveying 55 versed participants who reside in a coastal area and have coastal flood experiences. The data analysis included ordinal probit regression and descriptive analysis.
Findings
The results suggest that robustness is the highest weighted criterion for implementing SF design in coastal cities. The results demonstrated that ecosystem restoration is the highest-ranked SF flood solution followed by green infrastructure. Moreover, the results highlighted that age, duration spent in the program and prior knowledge of SF are significantly related to AEC students’ interest to learn this concept.
Originality/value
SF design anticipates failures while designing infrastructures thus minimizing failure consequences due to flood disasters. The findings can facilitate the implementation of the SF design concept during the construction of new infrastructures in coastal cities as well as educate the future workforces to contribute to developing resilient built environments.