2026 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

The construction industry is increasingly confronted with the dual challenge of delivering projects efficiently while simultaneously advancing environmental and social sustainability goals. Project leaders must not only manage technical complexity and optimize resources but also embed sustainable practices throughout the project life cycle. Traditional construction management (CM) education, however, tends to emphasize procedural and technical knowledge without fully equipping students to address sustainability or manage interdisciplinary collaboration effectively. This disconnect creates a critical need for educational frameworks that merge sustainability principles with project management (PM) practices to prepare graduates for leadership in a rapidly evolving industry.
This project introduces and evaluates a sustainability-oriented PM framework designed to enhance both construction research and educational outcomes. The initiative positions undergraduate students at the center of an experiential learning process, where they adapt established PM methodologies—such as Agile, Lean Construction, and hybrid models—to research contexts addressing construction and infrastructure sustainability. Students engage in a structured semester-long sequence that includes literature reviews, interviews with faculty-led research teams, and collaborative development of a PM toolkit. The toolkit features milestone planning templates, communication protocols, dashboards, and sustainability metrics tailored to construction settings, emphasizing lifecycle-oriented decision-making and resource efficiency.
Pilot implementations with active construction-related research projects provide an applied testing ground for the framework. Preliminary results indicate measurable improvements in collaboration quality, reduction of rework, and heightened awareness of sustainability practices among student researchers. Faculty participants reported that embedding PM frameworks within research workflows strengthened accountability, clarified roles, and improved interdisciplinary integration across diverse project teams. These findings suggest that sustainable PM frameworks have the potential to reduce inefficiencies while aligning academic research processes more closely with professional construction practices.
The educational contribution of this initiative is equally significant. By directly involving undergraduates in research-driven innovation, the project advances experiential learning and problem-based education models that have been shown to improve student engagement and professional readiness. Students not only gain technical knowledge of PM tools but also practice teamwork, systems thinking, and decision-making skills in construction careers. Embedding Lean Construction principles within research-based learning further connects academic instruction with industry-recognized best practices, bridging the gap between STEM research methodologies and construction engineering education.
Ultimately, this project offers a replicable model for integrating sustainable PM practices into construction curricula. By aligning professional PM frameworks with academic research and instruction, the initiative contributes to both educational innovation and global sustainability goals. It demonstrates that construction management programs can play a transformative role in shaping future professionals who can deliver efficient, transparent, and resilient projects. The broader impact extends beyond construction management, offering a scalable model for other disciplines seeking to integrate sustainability, project management, and experiential learning into engineering education.