http://www.kansan.com/stories/2007/apr/27/steel/?news
During the judging for KU’s steel bridge, the infrastructure collapsed….Clay said that last year the KU team was disqualified for a similar problem….(least they are consistent in what they teach)
The KU team of about 20 engineering students has been preparing since September (?), when they started designing the structure. Joe Pattison, Overland Park junior, said the team looked at what other successful teams had done to create its own original design. (apparently not closely enough)
Pattison, a first-year member, said he was impressed with Kansas State University’s assembly. (because it worked?)
“K-State looked like they didn’t even use nuts and bolts,” Pattison said. “Everything just clicked into place. It only took them about six minutes.” (K-Staters treated this like an elementary school project)
LOL there are so many awesome levels to this article i dont know where to begin. well, one would be don’t hire any ku CIVIL engineers to build stuff for you (especially over K-State ones) ahahahahahaha!
Allright, you’ve touched a nerve. I feel like I’m being baited here and who am I to resist a good argument…
http://www.news.ku.edu/2006/june/5/motorsports.shtml
You’re joking right? Are you seriously judging all KU engineers by two years’ results of one regional design competition for civil engineers? At best that’s misinformed, at worst downright dumb. KU finished 4th out of 140 teams last year at the international SAE Formula Car Challenge. KU is the ONLY team who’s formula car (which they engineered and built virtually part-by-part on their own) has for the past 7 consecutive years succesfully raced and survived every event (i.e. the endurance event, which breaks many cars yearly) at FSAE. Not MIT, not Rensselaer, not UTA, not Michigan have been able to accomplish that. Does this mean KU is a better engineering school than those or graduates better engineers? In general I’d say obviously not. So why base your argument against ALL KU engineers on this one static structure design competition? I know KU civil engineers, I’m around them basically every day at the engineering library, and I can tell you first hand many of them don’t take their classes even halfway seriously. There’s no need to, their classes are easy. Just today a group of 5 (juniors going on seniors no less) came to the library, talked loudly about how drunk they’ve been the past few weeks, how many run-ins with the police their friends have had lately, disturbed everyone who was actually studying and then left 20 minutes later. I wish I was embellishing that, I really do. I know they were junior/senior civies because 3 were roomates of my buddy charlie. Apparently that’s their usual behavior.
I’ve taken the CE statics class (which BTW was taught by one of the brightest professors and THE most personable professor I’ve had at KU- def. not the department’s fault) and I’m taking one of their graduate courses this summer. It’s based in algebra. The undergraduate ME “equivalent” is based in partial differential equations. I still barely believe that they are going to count it as one of my electives towards my degree as they’ve told me, but even if they don’t… Meh. It’s algebra. And it’s a subject I’m interested in.
Anyway, if you’re going to continue the sweeping generalizations, generalize KU civil engineering STUDENTS and do it based on what I’ve said, not two years of this one competition.
Comment by patrick — Monday, April 30, 2007 @ 6:35 pm
heh nice work. i fixed my statement, although not going to add students because if they can’t do it while they are being taught directly, its plausable to assume they’ll struggle in the real world as well.
Comment by Andy — Monday, April 30, 2007 @ 7:55 pm
Since you are using my quote, I think I had better clear up a few things.
1) KU’s steel bridge had a weld failure in the box truss span of the bridge which was fabricated by Flush Nut Truss company (http://www.flushnuttruss.com/). This was unfortunate, because KU’s Steel Bridge team paid for the fabrication and had no part in its failure (a lesson for next year of course).
2) K-State had a very good steel bridge and has consistently done well in the AISC student steel bridge competition. They did not treat it like a Kindergarten project (which I’m sure their team captains would love to hear, who I know spent countless hours designing, fabricating, practicing, etc.). They get a ton of sponsorship money, have more resources (CNC plasma cutter for example) and I had no problem giving them props even in our own school paper.
3) UMKC’s bridge/team won the competition. They also went on to place higher at the national competition. I don’t think they will be posting any similar articles about K-State just because they did a better job.
4) In response to an earlier comment from a ME student, I think the Mechanical Engineering department is very good at KU. BUT you get COURSE CREDIT for working on your precious car. Yes, some of it is volunteered, but most of the work comes from the seniors on the team who are actually getting credit for their work. You also get a ton of money from sponsors (more than you’re allowed to by the competition regulations, I’m told by a Jayhawk Motorsports team member). I’m sure you can find at least 3 junior/senior ME students talking about their drinking behavior (or being disruptive) just as easily at the library as you can CE students.
Comment by Joe — Thursday, June 21, 2007 @ 5:59 pm
heh this was mostly meant in jest cause i went to kansas state, but thanks for all the information anyway.
Comment by Andy — Monday, July 9, 2007 @ 12:08 am