January 8th Meeting – Spaghetti Tower Build & Code Discussion
January 14, 2008
This session started with Michael Nelson (Skanska) leading a spaghetti tower build activity. The activity was intended to introduce the students to a general contractor’s and construction manager’s focus on the scope, schedule, and budget of a construction project.
- The scope of the project was to build the tallest tower possible with the given materials (a box of spaghetti and a bag of large marshmallow)
- The schedule of the project was 30 minutes.
- The budget was determined by the amount of time spent on the design phase ($1 Million per minute) and the time spent on the construction phase ($2 Million per minute).
Refer to the pictures below of the tower building activity.
The second half of the meeting was used to introduce the student to building codes and why they are necessary. This part of the discussion was led by Dora Chan (Stoeker and Northway Architects), Jon Chan (Stoeker and Northway Architects), and Jani Nair (City of San Jose).
