Virtual design and construction is the topic of a new professional certification program at Stanford University’s Center for Integrated Facilities Engineering (CIFE). But it’s not so much about 3-D modeling, software, hardware or magical visualizations as it is about an integrated approach to linking all the tools at your disposal, including data-driven design and organization and decision process modeling. The course teaches that VDC isn’t a tool but a framework that leverages an array of technology to accomplish superior work.
“It’s about how you make that idea happen,” explains recent graduate Sagar Gandhi, Southern California BIM leader for DPR Construction Inc., Newport Beach, Calif. He says the course is not about any specific software at all. “It’s about the way we are thinking, and by the end of it [the students] understand you have to be collaborative...with all the stakeholders.”