It was my privilege to be involved in the CIOB Student Challenge final for 2013 yesterday. This is a national competition, involving regional heats for teams from colleges all over the UK.

I helped set the challenge for the day, and also with the judging. The challenge was a toughie – looking at the construction industry in 2050, how it might change, what life would be like, and how businesses and our industry would work.( I might have mentioned this before….!)

As I said at the end , there are governments and lots of clever people looking at this stuff and making a hash of it – so having to produce a report and presentation in less than 6 hours was a tall order!

I won’t single out any one team, although the “winners” were well deserved – just!. The overall standard of all the teams was excellent, and the marking was very very close, and there was real energy and engagement throughout the whole day by everyone involved. And there were some fantastic ideas, including new funding models for projects, use of nanotechnology, robotics, energy producing pavements, algae energy generation, and bio waste digestion, and much more!

As Chris Blythe of the CIOB said in conclusion , the future for the industry looks very bright with talented and professional people like this group of students coming through.

Special thanks to everyone at CIOB, the sponsors Extratherm, the guys at Segro for hosting the supporters, and for everyone taking part – it was a great day!

cheers

J