The culminating design project should be the most exciting course of your civil engineering program as it allows you the opportunity to put into practice many of your technical skills to solve a real world engineering design project. This capstone experience is designed as a two semester class where during the fall semester you will take a 1 credit hour course in professional practices that culminates with the formation of a team proposal for one of the sponsored design projects.

Teams are self-formed in groups of three. Some like to form teams of students all specializing in the same area, but it can be more effective to have a multi-disciplinary team. Through an internship or other connection you may wish to propose a project for your team. You can do this as long as the project has a professional sponsor, and meets the general guidelines for projects in terms of scope as outlined in the proposal template below. You need to have the project proposal in by the middle of August in order to ensure it can be considered.

2016-2017 PDF Sample Project Proposal Template (Editable template in MS Word format to be distributed in class)

During the winter semester you will sign up for a 3-credit hour "internship" where you will work together with your team, mentored by the graduate student responsible for the design project to complete the work outlined in the scope. There will be a weekly meeting to review progress and you will "clock in/out" as with a real internship experience (though you will not be paid) on your own defined schedule.