Mission
“The mission of the Faculty of Construction Management and Wood Products Engineering is to promote the utilization of sustainable construction practices and renewable wood products through teaching, research and outreach.”
“….for a sustainable built environment”
Welcome
CMWPE
- Offering BS, MS, MPS and PhD degrees in Construction Management and Wood Products Engineering
The Department of Construction Management and Wood Products Engineering offers two Bachelor of Science degrees: Construction Management and Wood Products Engineering. Both degrees prepare students for a wide variety of professional careers with particular focus to the construction and wood products manufacturing or marketing industries. The programs are designed to promote the utilization of sustainable construction practices and the sustainable manufacture and use of renewable wood products.
The department is expanding its coursework offerings to include a concentration area in Sustainable Construction and Renewable Materials for CMWPE students with an interest in green construction and materials beginning in the Fall of 2008.
Undergraduate Program
Undergraduate Program Highlights:
- The undergraduate program is expanding to include a concentration area in Sustainable Construction and Renewable Materials available beginning in the fall of 2008. This study area is available for students majoring in either Construction Management or Wood Products Engineering.
- CMWPE offers a minor in Construction Management for qualified ESF and Syracuse University students
- CMWPE is offering a new minor in Sustainable Construction beginning in the fall of 2008.
- A minor in business management is available for qualified students through Syracuse University. For details on our curriculum and coursework offerings please visit the ESF College Catalog.
Graduate Program
Master of Science (M.S.), Master of Professional Studies (M.P.S.), and Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degrees in construction management and wood products engineering are available through the program in Environmental and Resource Engineering in the Division of Engineering.
News and Announcements
New facilities.
In May 2007, the CMWPE department and faculty offices, N.C. Brown Center for Ultrastructure Studies, the C.J.K. Wang Wood Decay Lab, the Wood Utilization Service and the NYSTAR IEQ Lab moved to the second floor of Baker Laboratory. The Tropical Timber Information Center has moved to the first floor of Baker. The new construction management classroom, wood identification classroom and renovated laboratories in the one-story Baker annex are near completion. New laboratories include building materials research, construction safety, and an updated wood machining lab. Our new Wood Protection, Seasoning, Physics, Engineering, and Engineered Composite Materials labs are complete and in operation.
Outstanding Student Awards
Outstanding Student Awards were presented in April 2007 to Zachary R. Walton and Nathan Tretiak by the Northeast Section of the Forest Products Society.
In October, 2007 SUNY-ESF and the Department of CMWPE joined the Consortium for Research on Renewable Industrial Materials (CORRIM).
CMWPE faculty and students participated in the first annual Syracuse Area Construction Career Days held at the State Fair grounds on October 18th 2007. Kenneth Tiss served on the steering committee for the event and organized the tours for the high school students as they arrived. CMWPE undergraduate students Gary Baron, Nick Herrara-Cave, Dave Emmi, Joe Barone, Andrea Martin, Carl Arcuri, Neil Kohan, Pat Farrell, Peter Kepley, Rob Reed, Phil Nielsen, Dave Keith, Nolan Reeves, and graduate students, Santosh Yamagar,Jason Hussar, and Derek Van Campen served as guides for the high school groups, while George Kyanka and Susan Anagnost met with high school students at the CMWPE booth.
New England Kiln Drying Association awarded scholarships to two CMWPE students October 30 2007:
- The 2007 NEKDA Maurice Roy Scholarship Award was presented to James S. Brown, a junior in Wood Products Engineering at SUNY-ESF. The scholarship comes with a cash award of $1,500 which was presented at the fall meeting of the NEKDA in Owego New York, Oct. 30-31, 2007.
- The 2007 NEKDA Bill Delmhorst Scholarship Award was presented to Neil Kohan, a senior in Wood Products Engineering at SUNY-ESF. The scholarship comes with a cash award of $1,200 which was presented at the fall meeting of the NEKDA in Owego New York, Oct. 30-31, 2007.
Annual Associated Schools of Construction Region I Construction Management Competition.
Six Construction Management students, Ryan Baker, Ben Kovach, Dan LeVea, Nick Savas, Nick Thomasi and Joe Tamburello participated in the Annual Associated Schools of Construction Region I Construction Management Competition held in Fairfield, New Jersey November 8-11. Advisors for the group included employees of The Haynor-Hoyt Corporation, Jeremy Thurston, Gus Hernandez, Marty Rainbow, Lou Polleto and Mike Hargrove; and CMWPE Instructor Ken Tiss. The ESF team was co-sponsored by The Haynor-Hoyt Corporation.
Upcoming events
- Speaker Series in Sustainable Construction and Renewable Materials
- January 24, 2008 Dr. James Bowyer
- February 7, 2008 Dr. Wayne Trusty, President of Athena Sustainable Materials Institute
- April 17, 2008 Dr. Bruce Lippke
- Kiln-drying Workshop, January 7-10, 2008
- Green Building Conference, March 27-28, 2008
- SUNY Conversations in the Disciplines:
- Sustainable Construction: A Perspective to the year 2013, March 7, 2008
Research Highlights
In May 2007, a CARTI grant, sponsored by the Syracuse University Center of Excellence in Environmental and Energy Systems (Syracuse CoE) was awarded to Susan Anagnost for the project, Membrane-based DNA technique to simultaneously detect opportunistic, pathogenic and wood-decay fungi in buildings.
It was announced on October 1, 2007 that a Technology Application and Demonstration grant, sponsored by the Syracuse Center of Excellence, was awarded to Matthew Darin (Environmental Laboratory Services, North Syracuse, NY) and Susan Anagnost. The project, Application and Demonstration of Macroarray Analytical Techniques for the Detection of Fungal Bioaerosols in Buildings, will facilitate rapid and accurate identification of fungi in air samples.
Student organizations
- Student Construction Association
- Forest Products Society Student Chapter
- Emerging Green Builders
Admissions information
Many students who enter programs in construction management or wood products engineering are transfer students. Graduates of A.S. programs in liberal arts, math/science, and engineering/science as well as A.A.S. programs in architectural, civil, construction, mechanical, and wood technologies are encouraged to apply. Students with or without two-year degrees who meet all lower-division requirements and have 62 credits in acceptable course work transfer as juniors for a four-semester program. Students who have completed pre-calculus, but have not completed chemistry and/or physics or have not met most of their general education requirements generally finish in five or six semesters.
Scholarships
Recent scholarships winners:
- The H. P. Brown Scholarship in the amount of $1000 was awarded to Bernard Randrianarisoa, a Ph.D. Candidate in Wood Products Engineering
- The John Meyer Wood Plastic Scholarship in the amount of $650 was awarded to Neil Kohan, currently a senior in Wood Products Engineering.
For more details on these and other scholarships visit our scholarship information page. A limited number of Teaching Assistantships are also available for qualified graduate student applicants.
Facilities, Institutes and Centers
A major renovation to the teaching and research laboratories is nearing completion.
Construction Management renovated laboratory facilities include a computer facility with estimating, scheduling, project management, wood engineering design, computer aided design and drafting, finite element analysis and other specialized software and a new Construction Methods and Safety Lab.
Wood Products Engineering Laboratory facilities include a mechanical testing laboratory with a wide range of testing equipment , electronic data acquisition facilities, and wood processing facilities including a dry kiln, wood preservation equipment, a new wood machining laboratory, sawmill, and a expanded facilities to include Building Materials Research for Green Construction and Low-cost Housing Research.
The C.J.K. Wang Wood Biodegradation Laboratory includes mycology culturing facilities and a modern molecular analysis laboratory; research microscopes, image analysis system and wood microtechnique equipment.
One of the largest wood collections in the world, the H. P. Brown Memorial Wood Collection, is used to support the graduate research program of the Tropical Timber Information Center. The center also maintains the Carl deZeeuw Memorial Library.
A complete microscopy and image analysis laboratory is provided by the N.C. Brown Center for Ultrastructure Studies. This equipment includes a transmission electron microscope, scanning electron microscopes with energy dispersive x-ray analysis and particulate analysis accessories, and a wide variety of light microscopes equipped with image enhancement and various video image analysis capabilities. Graduate students from ESF as well as SU have access to coursework in microscopy which provides access to the microscopy equipment for their research projects. Faculty and graduate students are encouraged to gather expert advice from the staff of the Ultrastructure Center on tissue preparation and interpretation as well counsel on the most recent research approaches utilizing microscopy. Graduate students in CMWPE using this equipment have the best available systems to relate the macroscopic behavior of wood to its anatomical characteristics.
The Renewable Materials Institute conducts research in the broad area of sustainable development of wood resources and the uses of wood products.
Professional and Industrial Organizations
- Society of Wood Science and Technology
- Forest Products Society
- Northeastern Retail Lumber Association
- Empire State Forest Products Association
- Consortium for Research on Renewable Industrial Materials
- International Research Group on Wood Protection
- International Association of Wood Anatomists
- American Wood Preservers’ Association
- New England Kiln Drying Association
- Associated General Contractors of America
- General Building Contractors of NYS
- US Green Building Council
- National Association of Home Builders
- Emerging Green Builders-Upstate NY
- Syracuse Builders Exchange
- American Institute of Constructors
- Constructor Certification Commission