Academics

The $10 million transformation of historic Francis Hall, the new headquarters for the Department of Construction Science, will be celebrated with a dedication at 12:30 p.m. April 9 in the College Station Hilton followed by an open house at Francis Hall.

An award-winning, 3-D short film created by two former Texas A&M visualization students has been selected for screening in a prestigious German film festival.

Widely known as a fertile training ground for Hollywood special effects professionals, the Department of Visualization at Texas A&M University is rapidly gaining stature among the nation’s leading programs in video game design.

Viz-a-GoGo, the annual showcase of digital wizardry conjured by graduate visualization students from the Texas A&M College of Architecture, will be staged in downtown Bryan May 6-9.

For the last 15 years, undergraduate College of Architecture students have spent a mandatory long semester abroad. An article in the Nov. 13, 2014 issue of The Texas A&M Foundation’s Spirit magazine, showcases the value of spending a “semester away.”

Texas A&M students are building build two “tiny houses” — a broad term generally referring to residences 300 square feet or less — that will be donated to a group providing affordable, sustainable housing for disabled, chronically homeless people in Central Texas.

Leading designers and healthcare administrators from North and South America will discuss Latin American and Caribbean healthcare facility design in the Spring 2015 Architecture for Health Lecture Series at Texas A&M.

Three groups of 14 fourth-year construction science students from Texas A&M University made a “positive and powerful” impression on construction industry executives with Dec. 2 presentations detailing schedules and safety protocols for the construction of a natural gas refinery on the Texas Gulf Coast.

For active, constructive engagement with his students, Jun-Hyun Kim, an assistant professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning at Texas A&M University, was named a 2014-15 Montague – Center for Teaching Excellence Scholar.

John Nichols, Texas A&M associate professor of construction science, is seeking $12,000 to build the world’s tallest freestanding Lego structure, which will be 150-foot tall and composed of 70,000 Lego blocks.

Visualization students created computer-animated objects with Houdini, the same software used to make blockbuster movies such as “Frozen,” at an Oct. 17-19, 2014 workshop hosted by Texas A&M’s Learning Interactive Visualization Experience Lab.

For exceptional teaching and service, George Eustace, industry relations coordinator for the Department of Construction Science at Texas A&M University, recently earned the 2014 W.A. Klinger Construction Education Award from the American Institute of Constructors.

A new book of classic and contemporary writings illustrating key themes shaping the theory and practice of ecological design and planning, compiled by Texas A&M urban planning professor Forster Ndubisi, will be available this December.

Harold Adams ‘61, chairman emeritus of RTKL, one of the world’s largest design firms, and an Outstanding Alumnus of the College of Architecture, was among the elite group selected as Faculty Fellows for Texas A&M’s Institute for Advanced Study.

The Master of Architecture program at Texas A&M University is making strong, unique contributions to architectural education, according to experts from the National Architectural Accrediting Board team who reviewed the program last fall.