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Internship

jar546

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Today I met the new (and first) intern to the Town Manager. It got me thinking that maybe we should have interns in the Building Department too. Did anyone ever have a college intern work in their department?
 
I know one maybe two that had people working on their FPE,,, work on projects in the Fire Marshals office
 
We have them all the time. We have some administration students come in to complete their work attachments with us, we have high school students interested in taking engineering or architecture do a work attachment for 4hrs per week for a semester, and every summer we have engineering students.

These people are usually shared with another department or two to give them a good cross section of experiences. Remember, each party should get as much as they give in the relationship.
 
We did in my previous jurisdiction over a decade ago. She later became an inspector for a nearby jurisdiction. Now she works for ICC as part of the technical staff. True story. Amazing person. Good friend.
 
We have them all the time. We have some administration students come in to complete their work attachments with us, we have high school students interested in taking engineering or architecture do a work attachment for 4hrs per week for a semester, and every summer we have engineering students.

These people are usually shared with another department or two to give them a good cross section of experiences. Remember, each party should get as much as they give in the relationship.
I would love for designers to work on this side of the counter for a bit...
 
What do you see as the issues that designers do not appreciate?
 
We did in my previous jurisdiction over a decade ago. She later became an inspector for a nearby jurisdiction. Now she works for ICC as part of the technical staff. True story. Amazing person. Good friend.
I know who you are talking about, and she is AMAZING! And yes, a REALLY good friend to have!
 
Yes, had one last year. She will be an architect someday. My regret is that she was tasked with mundane admin stuff and couldn't spend more time looking at things from the code official side. But still a great idea.
 
Most of the designers I see know very little about code....
That's throwing the truth! It's extremely frustrating when an architect does the engineering for a project instead of having a structural engineer do it, I know some places don't permit this but it's permitted here in Kentucky and you wouldn't believe some of the things we see.
 
I think it is a great practice and personally believe it should be required as a stint in architectural school to do a internship in a building department.

However, with the number of students to building departments that could be a hard task, as to the level of information design schools spend on building codes, I have always been told, that what engineers are for.

And I will add this, I was part of the fabrication and installation team that did all the guards, seating, handrails, stairs and ramp access ADA upgrades for Radio City Music Hall Back between 2002 and 2007. While sitting in a meeting one day I made the off the cuff comment as to why are there so many mistakes with the designs for compliance and why do we the fabricator have to point them out at every meeting, The High end architectural design firm in attendance made the point to school me, (The only High School Diploma, only person, in the room), that the best designers no nothing about building codes and your best schools don't teach them in any manner that will restrict the thought of the creation at hand. It is the job of those that follow us to make our designs work.

and there in a nut shell I learned the true thought pattern on the designers motto, the less you know the more creative you are.

So that is why there are many times multiple architectural firms on larger projects, the one that comes up with the puff plan, and those that specialize in making the puff plan work.

18 years later it seems things are changing, but change takes time, and one of the things that everyone seems to forget is our field is inspection we seem to expect everyone to know what we are looking at and expect, and if they did, then what need is there for a building department in a perfect world?
 
Agree with tbz, I recently looked at an architectural curriculum and there was one, that's right ONE, class in codes and if memory serves it was more about the ICC, not actual codes, in a two-year program. Our intern confirmed there was little emphasis on codes in her (5 year?) program, which is why she was interning. She did see firsthand how we constantly struggled with non-compliant designs and expressed her desire to be better.

I have dealt with many architects that were very knowledgeable, even experts in codes. And many who were not but were accepting, open and eager to explore what they didn't know. I have also dealt with many who were not, and who didn't see the need. We can't lump them all together any more than we should be lumped together, because I can say the same thing about code officials. There will always be the good, the bad, and the ugly on all sides. (early morning Eastwood reference...gonna be a better day)

Internships should be encouraged to try to move the bad and the ugly to the good. Seeing things from our perspective can't hurt, and while I wouldn't presume to be able to intern with them, we could use a little perspective about what they do as well.

"Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in their shoes. That way, you'll be a mile from them, and you'll have their shoes." Jack Handy
 
Yep,,, Not sure if is a joke or not,,

I hear they teach one hour of code??

And,, still wonder why they think some of these designs are functional, and will last for years??
 
You can forgive most architects as they probably see code compliance as boring when they compare it to the creativity of design. Few people signed up for architect school wanting to learn all about the building code. Those people all became engineers.

Lets be honest, there is probably something wrong with all of us code nerds.
 
I have no issues with designers getting stuff wrong...I have a huge issue when they go back to their customer for thousands or hundreds of thousands for changes to the plans or the design to comply with the worst the law will allow....
 
The new Dept. head(from Cally) is trying to get an internship project going on the planning & zoning side but not the building side.
 
We are a small area working with the same firms over and over the last 20 years I had two Architects who would submit drawings that obviously will not meet code. After getting to know them and the fact that they where knowledgeable in the codes I just asked them one day why they knowingly submit non code compliant drawings. They both had the same answer. They provide what their client wants and then let the building department tell them it won't meet code so they are not the ones telling their clients that what they want will not work.
 
We are a small area working with the same firms over and over the last 20 years I had two Architects who would submit drawings that obviously will not meet code. After getting to know them and the fact that they where knowledgeable in the codes I just asked them one day why they knowingly submit non code compliant drawings. They both had the same answer. They provide what their client wants and then let the building department tell them it won't meet code so they are not the ones telling their clients that what they want will not work.

Sad in my opinion

Costs money and time
 
We are a small area working with the same firms over and over the last 20 years I had two Architects who would submit drawings that obviously will not meet code. After getting to know them and the fact that they where knowledgeable in the codes I just asked them one day why they knowingly submit non code compliant drawings. They both had the same answer. They provide what their client wants and then let the building department tell them it won't meet code so they are not the ones telling their clients that what they want will not work.
I've been told the same. Only once have I retorted that if they keep it up will I turn them into the state licensing board.
 
I have no issues with designers getting stuff wrong...I have a huge issue when they go back to their customer for thousands or hundreds of thousands for changes to the plans or the design to comply with the worst the law will allow....
I miss working in Byram Shore CT, but I have to say most of the clients had a no change order policy. I remember one project where the design team only put 2 exterior hose bibs on a 4800 sqft foot print home which had 3 rolling lower yard decks on the plans.

I asked the builder why so glum today, he said he was still waiting for the Architect and the Landscape Architect to decide who was going to foot the bill for the limited hose bibs with the client's project. It seems, as the builder noted, I get paid X amount each week we are managing the project for the client. However, the client was holding the designers to any costs to correct the mistakes that were not correct on the plans or inefficient.

This was especially interesting when the design teams forgot about 100ft of custom pool barrier was going to be required.

To dream the imperfect dream, and get paid for dreaming it, what ajob.
 
The building department should only be interested in one thing and that is whether the project complies with the laws. Whether the owner agrees to pay the designer more to deal with your comments is not your role.

I will let you in on a secret. I have found a number of plan checkers who did not know what they were doing. The problem is that designers don't always tell the plan checker that he or she is wrong which lets the plan checkers believe they are always right. Some times the decision is made to humor the plan checker and increase the cost of the project because that gets the job built quicker.

I had one plan checker who wanted me to prove something but in order to do that right it would take more time than I had. I knew that the design complied with the code. So I produced a totally bogus calculation that could be done much quicker and presented it to the plan checker. The plan checker was happy with what I gave him which documented the fact that he did not know what he was talking about.

There is one agency that tells the plan checkers that they want to see a lot of red marks on the drawings even if the designer has done a good job. The designer must then spend more time responding to those unnecessary comments.

Have some humility.
 
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