Weil Co-Organizes Panel on Women in Green Building Construction

As part of the monthly “Green Night Events” at the Clarion Hotel in Northampton, BCT extension faculty member Ben Weil co-organized a panel discussion with Jaqueline Cook on January 14th. This event took place under the umbrella of the Western Massachusetts Green Consortium (http://westernmassgreenconsortium.org). You can read more about this event in this WWLP News item. ...
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2014 BCT Alumni & Friends Newsletter: Season’s Greetings!

2014 BCT Alumni & Friends Newsletter: Season’s Greetings!

A Message from the BCT Program Director As we conclude another successful semester in the BCT program, we are very proud to now have close to 200 undergraduate students and 10 graduate students including several PhDs. This year brought some changes to our program: With Dave Damery retiring (more on that below), I have taken over as program director. We also have a new faculty member, Dr. Ho-Sung Kim (see also below) and we will embark on a search for a replacement for Dave Damery soon. We are also very excited about a new building that will soon be our home - the “Integrated Design Building”. This state-of-the-art building will encompass many sustainable features (like an engineered wood structure) and will offer us better spaces for teaching, collaboration, labs, shops, and computer facilities. More on this below. If you haven’t done so yet, I would encourage you to join the new BCT student and alumni LinkedIn group. It is a great way to stay...
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Weil and Clouston Participate in NSF Grant to Fund Sustainable Agriculture, Clean Energy Partnership with HCC, Hampshire

The National Science Foundation has awarded an $810,000 grant to Holyoke Community College, in partnership with UMass Amherst and Hampshire College, to create collaborative programs combining clean energy studies with sustainable agriculture and share new resources that will benefit students at all three schools. The grant supports a series of joint courses, the first of which will begin in the summer of 2015. Professors Peggi Clouston and Ben Weil of the Environental Conservation Department are working with John Gerber, professor of sustainable food and farming in the Stockbridge School of Agriculture, to create course content relating to agricultural structures, energy efficiency, and on-farm renewable energy. The grant will also fund new clean energy and agriculture equipment that will be used by students and researchers from all three schools, including a micro-farm greenhouse demonstration and training facility at the Agricultural Learning Center on North Pleasant Street. The micro-farm greenhouse demonstration and training facility will be managed by Amanda Brown and the UMass student...
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Hoque and Weil participate in another successful Eureka! summer

Hoque and Weil participate in another successful Eureka! summer

BCT faculty Ben Weil and Simi Hoque participated in this summer’s Project Eureka! a partnership between CNS and Girls, Inc. of Holyoke to provide STEM education to middle and high school girls from underrepresented communities. Ben taught a workshop on energy conservation in the built environment and Simi organized a tour of the zero energy Mill building in Holyoke and a workshop about passive design. This is the second year that BCT faculty have volunteered to teach building construction and technology concepts to Eureka! scholars. Peggi Clouston offered workshop during the inaugural summer (2013) on bridge design. Both Governor Deval Patrick and Senator Elizabeth Warren have recognized the program and thanked the faculty during their visits for volunteering their energy and time in this vitally important project. Links: Story on Deval Patrick's visit Story on Masslive about Senator Elisabeth Warren's visit ...
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Commencement 2014

Commencement 2014

We had the absolute pleasure to congratulate our graduating undergrad (BS) and grad (MS) students today and yesterday at UMass' commencement. Most but definitely not all of our undergrads are shown in the image above. Below are more impressions from these ceremonies. We are so proud of you all!!! All the best from us. ...
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