Andrew Lepore's Summer 2018 Internship

      It is still very early on in my internship. I’ve been with my company for two full weeks and I only signed my offer 3 weeks ago, but I’ve learned so much about my project and its implications on the world in the short time I’ve been here.

      For the next 11 weeks I will be working for Southland Industries. Southland is a young but fast-growing company that started on the West Coast and is slowly spreading its reach across the country. My company has many components including construction, engineering, energy, and maintenance. I’m working on the construction side. The company I’m working with specializes in making prefabricated MEP racks for buildings. Essentially what this means is we construct racks that contain all of the piping, plumbing, electrical, HVAC systems that can be transported and easily lifted into place in buildings to minimize cost, injuries, and time for construction.

      That’s a little bit about the company. What I’m doing is working on the Penn Medicine New Patient Pavilion (google the building, it’s going to be beautiful). Southland is a subcontractor on the project as part of a large team composed of many big name construction and architectural firms. The building is in the early stages of construction. Currently, the skeleton of the building is under construction with steel girders being placed and concrete being laid out. Majority of my time has been spent reviewing plans and making sure that the systems that we will be installing in the coming months are constructible and able to support the work that will be done in the hospital. This is a $1.5 billion project and the work done here will save thousands for years to come, but it’s our job to make sure that the doctors and nurses will have everything they need to perform their jobs to the fullest.

      This is a little longer than expected but I’m so excited to be a part of this important project. Hopefully prospective students will see this and develop an interest in Construction Engineering!