Achieving higher capability maturity in construction process improvement

Process improvement has been identified as one of the potential mechanisms to achieve the desired performance improvements within the UK construction industry. In addition, it has further been recognised the importance of learning construction process improvement lessons from other industry examples. Software industry has exemplified a successful implementation of a process improvement strategy, based on the Capability Maturity Model (CMM) which evaluate the capabilities and maturities of organisations in concern to establish the next level of process improvements needed. This model consists of five maturity levels where level 1 being the least matured and level 5 being the most matured. After considering the close similarities between the software industry and the construction industry, the principles of software CMM were attempted to be applied within the construction industry, under the research project “Structured Process Improvement in Construction Enterprises (SPICE)”. Within this research the Key Process Areas (KPAs) of level 1, 2 and 3 of software CMM were evaluated and customised to the UK construction industry, after taking its unique characteristics into consideration. This leaves the software CMM level 4 and 5 KPAs unevaluated and un-customised, leaving the maximum potential of SPICE un-revealed. This paper aims at addressing this gap by reviewing the literature on construction process improvement and the software CMM to evaluate the applicability of software CMM higher capability maturity level KPAs within the UK construction context

Legal Aspects of Architecture, Engineering and the Construction Process by Justin Sweet

Syftet med detta examensarbete är att ta reda på vilken kunskap lärare har om undervisning i läsförståelse, hur lärare på lågstadiet beskriver sin undervisning men även hur läsundervisningen förändras efter att eleven knäckt läskoden och kommit igång med sin läsning. Det empiriska materialet består av insamlad data genom intervjuer med sex lågstadielärare. Studien är kvalitativ med en fenomenografisk metodansats men även inspirerad av fenomenolgin. Resultaten visar att lärarna har svårt att definiera och beskriva vad läsförståelse är. I lärarnas  yrkesspråk saknas många ord och begrepp för att tala om läsning och läsförståelse . Att döma av hur lärarna beskriver sin undervisning har de ingen tydlig struktur för arbetet med läsförståelse, även om de nämner ett antal olika arbetssätt, och det tycks inte finnas någon väl genomtänkt progression för elevens läsförståelseutveckling. Nivåanpassade läromedel och individualisering är det sätt som vanligtvis används när undervisningen ska anpassas efter elevens utveckling i läsförståelse. Studien visar också att det behövs mera fortbildning för lärarna i vad läsning och läsförståelse är. Goda kunskaper om läsprocessen och läsförståelse är en förutsättning för att nå goda resultat i läsundervisningen

Inside the Construction Operating Theater at SECCM Labs

Shawmut Design & Construction welcomes students on-site to observe and dissect the construction process as the new laboratories building takes shape

SUPERVISION OF THE CONSTRUCTION PROCESS

Almost six years have passed since Zolitūde tragedy and more than five years – since the new construction regulations have come into force, but the process of responsibility definition in construction is still topical. The supervision of construction process. requires checking.The aim of paper is to summarize and analyse information about how supervision of the construction process works now and how it is going to change or is necessary to be to changed.The methods of historical, teleological, systematic text condensation, analysis and comparative analysis of research, information analysis and summarising about how supervision of the construction process works now and how it is going to change or is necessary to be changed are used.The main conclusion shows that the construction process norms of supervision should be laid down in a single normative act in order to avoid duplication and partial interpretation, because the normative acts contain contradictions between the norms of different legal force and also in one norm

Property, construction process and environment. Three elements of legal structure which regulate our right to housing : a strange causal link

32 páginas.Trabajo de Curso de Experto Universitario en Derecho Español Impartido en Inglés: Estudio de Conjunto (2014/15). The fundamental object of analysis of the Project presented here is the relationship between Property and Environment, and the obvious manifestation of this Environment in the Natural Parks; specifically, in the Andalusian region. In order to thoroughly know the inner workings of such protected natural areas, we have also analyzed its Sustainable Development Plans; and the various threats that fall directly onto the sustainability and effective protection of Natural Resources and how affect this environmental idea in construction process. Keywords: Property; Rights; Construction Process, Environment; Protected Natural Areas; Natural Parks; Natural Resources; Quality of Life; Responsibility; Social Awareness

Radial basis function classifier construction using particle swarm optimisation aided orthogonal forward regression

We develop a particle swarm optimisation (PSO) aided orthogonal forward regression (OFR) approach for constructing radial basis function (RBF) classifiers with tunable nodes. At each stage of the OFR construction process, the centre vector and diagonal covariance matrix of one RBF node is determined efficiently by minimising the leave-one-out (LOO) misclassification rate (MR) using a PSO algorithm. Compared with the state-of-the-art regularisation assisted orthogonal least square algorithm based on the LOO MR for selecting fixednode RBF classifiers, the proposed PSO aided OFR algorithm for constructing tunable-node RBF classifiers offers significant advantages in terms of better generalisation performance and smaller model size as well as imposes lower computational complexity in classifier construction process. Moreover, the proposed algorithm does not have any hyperparameter that requires costly tuning based on cross validation

Knowledge construction process in online learning

One of applications in online learning environment is the use of forum or discussion through online communication facilities as a learning activity. This paper focuses on the process of knowledge construction in online discussion designed to be used with mobile technology. The research participants comprised 45 postgraduate students enrolled in a research methodology course. These participants were involved in the online discussion as one of the mode of delivery for the course. Data were collected through open ended questionnaire to tap into their perceptions about online learning activity through online discussion. They were also asked to do metacognitive reflections to explain step by step on how do they make conclusion on the meaning of a specific concept from the online discussion. Data were analysed using content analysis as the means of analysis. Result of the study shows majority of respondents agreed that online discussion helps the knowledge construction process through critical examinations of other peoples idea in the discussion. Overcoming psychological barriers is one of the important aspects offered by online environment that facilitate students involvement in constructing knowledge as compared to face to face discussion. Further analysis on the learning process revealed pattern of steps used by the students in constructing the meaning through the discussion process

Instrumented activity and semiotic mediation: two frames to describe the conjecture construction process as curricular organizer

We document part of the process through which conjectures produced by students, with the aid of the dynamic geometry software Cabri, when they solve proposed geometric problems, become a curriculum organizer in the classroom. We first focus on characterizing students’ instrumented activity recurring to utilization schema (Rabardel, 1995, in Bartolini Bussi and Mariotti, 2008), and then describe the teacher’s content management through which the ideas produced by the students become key elements of knowledge construction