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Lindsey Adams (green jacket) and her teammates test the strength of their truss bridge

Civil Engineering Class Tests Student Know-how

By the time Lucas Miller reached eight books, a crowd of classmates began to form around his team in the West Wing Lobby of Kingsbury Hall.

鈥淣ine, ten, eleven鈥︹��

An admiring whisper of 鈥淭hat鈥檚 sick鈥� came from the back of the room as Miller, a first-year civil engineering student from Rindge N.H., stacked 12, 13, and finally 14 copies of Strunk and White鈥檚 iconic Elements of Style neatly in the middle of a paper bridge that spanned 23 inches between two chairs. At 14 books, the bridge, which consisted of two long tubes of paper, began to buckle.

鈥淩emember, if the bridge breaks you get no credit,鈥� warned graduate teaching assistant and contest judge Sam White. And that was all Miller鈥檚 team needed to hear. They had to sweat through nearly a dozen other presentations, but when the final bell rang, 14 books and 23 inches proved just the right combination of strength and span to win the bridge building contest and earn an 鈥淎+鈥� for the team.

The contest was part of associate professor Ray Cook鈥檚 introduction to civil engineering course and is intended, Cook says, 鈥渘ot only to get students thinking like civil engineers, but also to get them excited about doing engineering.鈥� So, in addition to structural engineering, environmental engineering, water resources, materials, and geotechnical engineering, Cook liberally sprinkles class time with discussion of current events, such as the water shortage in the U.S. and China, and with opportunities for students to bond over challenging subject matter.

And bond they do, as on the afternoon of the contest groups huddled piecing together their 25-piece allotment of office paper with a small quantity of Scotch tape. Lindsey Adams鈥� team made some rapid progress on an elegant looking truss style bridge. 鈥淏asically, we were trying to find the best way to match the materials with the load,鈥� she says. 鈥淭he triangles of our bridge should spread out the support across the bridge. At least that鈥檚 the plan.鈥� Adams鈥� plan was good enough to hold nine books over a 21.5-inch span 鈥� not a prize-winning result on this particular day but a very good effort.

Team Miller considered taking a 鈥減enalty鈥� point in exchange for getting extra paper from White鈥攁 ploy that fell within the contest rules鈥攂ut ultimately rejected the idea. 鈥淲e focused on creating the strongest beam style bridge we could,鈥� explains Miller. 鈥淲e didn鈥檛 want to have a lot of joints that could fail.鈥� Each section of the tube bridge had other tubes inside of it. In the middle, additional paper provided even more reinforcement.

For one day at least, in the eternal struggle of truss versus beam, beam won. But other lessons were learned by all, including how to play well with others, how to follow strict guidelines, and how to articulate the complexities of your project to a complete stranger who pesters you with questions while you鈥檙e working.

鈥淐ivil engineers have to learn how to work with planning boards, town councils, and other kinds of people,鈥� says Cook, who won the 2012 Brierly Award for Teaching Excellence. 鈥淭hey have to speak well and write well as well as do the math.鈥�

And this explains the adoption of Strunk and White鈥檚 classic as the 鈥渓oad鈥� the student inventions must bear. 鈥淚t鈥檚 required reading in the class,鈥� says Miller. 鈥淲e write a lot of papers.鈥�

Bridges are like sentences: the element of style goes a long way.

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