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Are you a hands-on, practical, get-it-done person who would like to work on the team that erects the impressive buildings in which we work and live?

The construction process grows more complex all the time with increasing varieties of materials, tradesmen, equipment and environmental requirements. The world needs people who can understand and use designers’ ideas to build the wonderful structures that serve mankind. Construction managers pick up where design stops, moving the building process from mere concepts to reality. As young professionals these men and women know the details of construction materials and methods so they can estimate costs, schedule work, oversee job site activities and accomplish the many other project management tasks that serve clients’ needs for safe and high quality work completed on time and under budget. The work of few professions stands out as strongly or has served the world as long as that of constructors, which may be why construction managers tend to be so satisfied with their lives’ work.

Graduates of the construction management (CM) program at MSOE are among the best-prepared anywhere to enter the nation’s dynamic building construction industry as project professionals. Fully accredited, the program graduates students who show superior performance on the standard Constructor Qualification Examination, taken when seniors, by consistently scoring above the national average.

Construction Management Students

Careers in Construction Management

• technical ability
• managerial competence
• leadership skills
• professional ethical behavior

A graduate often begins a career as a field engineer or assistant project manager, who spends much time out-of-doors at the site laying out the work, estimating and controlling costs, scheduling work activities, and applying their initiative to keep the project on schedule, within budget, of high quality, and safe for all.

After proving him- or herself, they can advance to become a project manager with full authority for all aspects of the project, closely coordinating with and advising owners and designers, perhaps from the earliest stages of project design conception and until completion. They might also choose to remain more associated with activities on the construction site and advance to become a construction superintendent, who directly oversees all job actions that erect the building, making sure that people, equipment, and materials are well-coordinated to keep the work progressing as planned.

Some graduates become a cost estimator or scheduler, specializing in matters of project construction costs or determining how much time work activities and projects might demand. Specialized positions of these types normally develop in mid-sized and large construction organizations. Such concerns with calculating and controlling time and money permeate every project of the construction industry and, therefore, they are integrated throughout the MSOE Construction Management program.

These jobs are only examples of what our graduates often do. Many other types of management opportunities in the construction industry are open to those who earn the CM degree. Some of our alumni, for example, choose to work in residential or heavy construction. The MSOE CM education imparts a wide variety of knowledge and skills, so the sky is the limit for our graduates’ aspirations. Undoubtedly, new types of management jobs will develop as the construction industry evolves into the future, and MSOE CMs will be amply prepared to meet the challenges to lead the industry.

Double Major Option

Earn a second degree in only one more year. A popular and valuable optional program of study permits students to earn both the construction management and the architectural engineering bachelor’s degrees in five years: the "double major option." This uncommon combination of carefully integrated engineering and construction coursework gives "AE/CM" graduates the comprehensive education that often, otherwise must come from an engineering degree followed by graduate studies in construction management — except AE/CM requires only one more year of study, not multiple years. Double major graduates are qualified to seek the Professional Engineer license, as well as the Professional Constructor certification. This design-construction education is very well-matched to necessary knowledge for design-build construction project delivery, which continues to grow in popularity.

Model Full-Time Program Tracks

• Construction Management
• Architectural Engineering and Construction Management (Electrical Design Specialty)
• Architectural Engineering and Construction Management (Environmental Design Specialty)
• Architectural Engineering and Construction Management (Structural Design Specialty)

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