Teams chosen for MCAA student contest

Feb. 1, 2008
Palm Desert, Calif. A panel of judges has selected the four Mechanical Contractors Association of America student chapter teams that will make oral presentations of their bid proposals at MCAA's Student Chapter Competition in early March at the MCAA Annual Convention here. The teams are from Colorado State University, Milwaukee School of Engineering, Northeastern University and University of Washington.

Palm Desert, Calif. — A panel of judges has selected the four Mechanical Contractors Association of America student chapter teams that will make oral presentations of their bid proposals at MCAA's Student Chapter Competition in early March at the MCAA Annual Convention here.

The teams are from Colorado State University, Milwaukee School of Engineering, Northeastern University and University of Washington.

The judges selected the finalists after reading, discussing and scoring proposals submitted by 20 MCAA student chapters.

Criteria used for evaluating the proposals considered each written proposal's overall quality (20%), project management and organization (25%), feasibility of construction and program schedules (20%), quality of the conceptual design (15%) and accuracy/feasibility of conceptual costs (20%).

Adam Snavely of The Poole and Kent Corp., Baltimore, Md., Richard Perosa of H.T. Lyons Inc., Allentown, Pa., and Patrick Pottichen of Collins and Collins Mechanical Inc., Bristol, Pa., served as the first-round judges for this year's competition.

A different panel of judges will evaluate the oral presentations according to the following criteria: overall quality of the oral presentation (30%); feasibility of project management, organization and schedule (30%); accuracy and completeness of project costs (30%); and answers to the judges' questions (10%).

Each finalist team will have 20 minutes to convince the judges that they are the best qualified to perform the proposed work on the project — 15 minutes for a formal oral presentation and five minutes of answering the judges' questions. Each team's standing will be determined solely on the basis of their performance on the oral competition.

This year's project is based on the 58,000-sq.-ft. expansion of MCAA member J.F. Ahern Co.'s headquarters in Fond du Lac, Wis., and involves sustainability features. As in past years, the prizes are: $5,000 to the first-place team; $2,500 to the second-place team; and $1,000 to each of the other finalists. All finalists also will receive a trophy commemorating their achievement.

Additional information is at [email protected].

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