On April 26, 2019, an eighth-grade Marticville Middle School student from the Penn Manor School District participated in a Career Day Job Shadowing experience at Gilbert Architects Inc. The student’s goal was to see and experience what an architect does in a typical day.
While the student was with us for only a few hours, we wanted to give him an incredible learning experience and provide him with opportunities to practice what the team does daily in an architectural office. Since Gilbert Architects specializes in designing K–12 Public School facilities, we gave the student the chance to design “the classroom of his dreams.”
Using the most current building information modeling program, Revit 2019, and working with one of Gilbert’s senior BIM technicians, the student had “hands-on-mouse” experience in designing a classroom. This included selecting various wall types from a materials library and placing them onto a drawing. Once the classroom plan was completed, he moved on to spend time with one of Gilbert’s interior designers. Under her guidance, the student designed a pattern for the classroom floor then he selected samples of flooring materials and colors, as well as placing furniture in his classroom plan. With the planning completed and materials selected, the student met up with one of Gilbert’s architectural project managers to see his design in 3D and render it. A printed culmination of his time at Gilbert Architects was then presented as a take-away.
The eighth-grade student sent a note thanking us for allowing him to shadow the folks at Gilbert Architects and his mother also shared that he had a fun and educational experience and that it has only heightened his interest in Architecture.
Shared by, Rod Frey, Jr., Assoc. AIA, Studio Director
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