All In at the Design-Build Conference & Expo: Teams that Won Big in Vegas

We’re back from Las Vegas and reliving the 2025 Design-Build Conference & Expo in Part 1 of this two-part recap. This episode focuses on the teams that won big in Vegas: the Project of the Year, the Chair’s Award and the top three finishers in DBIA’s National Design-Build Student Competition.

Host Erin Looney brings you conversations from the competition and the awards show floor (yes, with plenty of background noise), starting with:

Project of the Year

Kansas City International Airport New Single Terminal and Garage
Guests: Mark Goodwin, Clark Construction
Awards: Aviation | Best in Process – Progressive Design-Build | Trailblazer in Inclusive Growth | National Award of Excellence | National Award of Merit | Project of the Year

Chair’s Award

Hurricane Ian Sanibel Island Access
Guests: Toby Mazzoni (Superior Construction), Paul Suellentrop (DeMoya Infrastructure)

2025 National Design-Build Student Competition

1st Place — D&T Construction (Cal Poly San Luis Obispo)
Students: Alyson Buchholz, Sergio Gonzalez, Coulter Langmaid, Casey Lavin, Jacquelyn Lomano (Captain)
Faculty Advisor: Tom Kommer

2nd Place — Cypress (University of Florida)
Students: Elijah John, Aidan Newsom, Asa Richards (Captain), Nicholas Soler, Lucas Wicks
Faculty Advisor: Russell Walters
Special Recognition: Asa Richards – Best Individual Presenter Award

3rd Place — Pioneer Design-Build (Alfred State College)
Students: Jessica Budd, Fernanda Ceja, Selena Fullone, Owen Lantiegne (Captain), Connor Welsh
Faculty Advisor: William Dean

Learn more about the National Design-Build Student Competition

Discover more of the 2025 award-winning design-build projects and teams. 

Get ready for future DBIA conferences.

Coming in Part 2:
Interviews with the 2025 Distinguished Leadership Award winners — Janice Zahn, Britt Sanford, David Shadpour, Jennifer Macks — and Brunelleschi Lifetime Achievement Award recipient Bill Reifsteck.

Access all our free design-build resources and learn more about Design-Build Done Right® at dbia.org.

DBIA members are shaping the future, one successful collaboration at a time.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to (Back From) Las Vegas
• 2:03 Airport Royalty: KCI is Project of the Year
• 14:48 The Project You Hope You Never Have to Do: Sanibel Island Access Wins Chair's Award
• 37:41 Cal Poly Hates to Lose: 2025 Student Competition Winner
• 37:52 Once a Gator, Always a Gator: Second Place with UF
• 43:06 There is No I in Team, but There is One in Individual: Best Individual Presenter Asa Richards
• 45:03 Creating a Legacy: Alfred State Shows Up Again
• 50:43 Before We Pass the Mic: Part 2 Coming in December

Transcript

Erin Looney  00:00

DBIA. Earlier this month, DBIA spent a week in Las Vegas with a large assortment of design build professionals at the 2025 Design Build Conference and Expo. Now this conference is always a super busy time. With so much going on, there is no way to truly capture the energy without you actually having been there, but we do like to try, so we did our best to recreate some of the excitement from the conference, specifically the project and team Awards and the National Design Build student competition. And that's not all, because in December, we have part two, where we're going to do it all again with interviews from our Distinguished Leadership Award winners and the 2025 Brunelleschi Lifetime Achievement Award winner. So even if being on site with us is a little like capturing lightning in a bottle or winning 1000 bucks at a slot machine, which I actually did, no joke, I won't tell the story here, but I did the interviews in these next two episodes will let you relive at least some of the fun, or create a little FOMO if you weren't there, I am your host. Aaron Looney, and this is part one of our 2025 design build, Conference and Expo recap from Las Vegas on the design build delivers podcast brought to you by Archons, an Autodesk Platinum Partner. Anyone who's been to Las Vegas knows winning is a possibility. So is the opposite, but we won't talk about that. What we will do is highlight some of the teams that won big in Vegas with DBIA, starting with this year's Project of the Year winner and the chairs award winner, which fair warning we recorded right in the middle of the after party chaos. You're going to hear all the celebration happening around us, but the Insight still lands. And then we're going to go to the future of design build with the top three student competition teams from the National Design Build student competition what you'll hear in these interviews are super quick hits, just a little preview of what the students had to say, because we're going to have a full student competition episode coming early in 2026 with interviews from the judges advisors and more from the teams themselves. Now let's get into the good stuff. Each year, DBIA honors the best in design. Build with our project team awards chosen by a jury of industry professionals. Our highest honor is Project of the Year, awarded to a project that exemplifies collaboration, innovation and excellence across all facets of design. Build this year, that honor went to the Kansas City International Airport, new single terminal and garage. This project reshaped an airport, redefined infrastructure for a region and reintroduced a city to the world. The team also earned merit and excellence awards in aviation, a trailblazer and inclusive growth award for large projects, best in process for progressive design, build and, of course, the coveted project of the year. You can find the full slate of award winning projects, including detailed write ups, photos and jury comments on dbias awards page. But for now, let's hear from Mark Goodwin, from Clark construction, a member of the team that proudly brought this terminal to life. Was a big night, last night for the Kansas City International Airport, five national honors from DBIA. You've got the Excellence in merit in aviation, best in process for progressive design, build trailblazer and inclusive growth. And of course, the big one, the project of the year. And that's quite a sweep. Five is an impressive number to take home. So what does all this recognition mean to your team and to Kansas City?

Mark Goodwin  03:24

It means an incredible honor. You know, we were surprised, really surprised, to be so successful last night, but it was an exciting project, and I do think it was deserved, but it is meaningful to the Aviation Department, to the city all the awards that we've won, but but we did really shine last night, and it was, it was really exciting for the team. And

Erin Looney  03:43

just this is kind of a bonus question, but did you have a large contingency from the project here to see this happen or to brag when you get back? We

Mark Goodwin  03:51

need to brag when we get back. Other commitments conflicted, but the team's really excited to hear the news. Good.

Erin Looney  03:57

We're talking about a $1.5 billion airport terminal that you delivered early and you delivered under budget. This is impressive, no matter what you're talking about, but, but you did this during the pandemic, so that kind of takes it to another level. How did your team maintain that kind of momentum through uncertainty, is a nice word for it, and you managed to also keep safety, schedule and quality on track.

Mark Goodwin  04:19

Times are crazy and incredibly challenging. We did have the benefit of being outdoor construction, because we did start just before the pandemic. So we were we were erecting steel at the time, but we did have four or 500 people on site, and I think it was about staying calm, communicating to our trade partners and our craft workers, setting the requirements and guidelines and then enforcing them. We did not stop the job at any point in time. We did go to on site, about 50% for our team, so it was a week on, a week off. I also think that with other projects not able to continue forward, there was some increased labor that did actually help the job move forward, because we were a job who was essential, and. And we were working outside, so it was a place that people could work, which was great,

Erin Looney  05:04

kind of a silver lining there. People didn't have other stuff to do, so you were able to, yeah, I mentioned that you won the best in process for progressive design build. What made that approach essential for success on this project, in terms of this scale, these conditions you were dealing with, and how did, how did that help the team manage the risk, make decisions, communicate effectively, talk a little more

Mark Goodwin  05:27

about that. Yeah, so progressive design, build. In our case, we set a target budget, and that's what we had to work to. And everybody bought into that target. You know, really, that threshold was set by the airlines. They were funding the job and financing it, and they said it can't go over this price. So everybody had to work within that and understand that that was the constraint. So if the owner wanted something that they couldn't afford, it it was understood. And if the architect wanted something that couldn't be afforded, it was understood. And whites Clarkson's role was to communicate where budget was. So we set a target point. We had contingencies that were appropriate, and as the risks were eliminated or worked through, there were savings, and we actually identified those savings early enough in the project where that money could be refunded or reprogrammed back into the project. Incredibly successful approach, where we set a target budget that was before we started design, and then we designed to it. And as the design completed, we were able to add scope, instead of deal with a budget problem after that. So I think the design build, progressive design build approach, really helped make it really clear to everyone the constraints that we had to stay inside. Was

Erin Looney  06:33

there anything in particular you had to sacrifice that? You'd look back and say, Well, it turned out okay, but at the time I was trying to fight for that.

Mark Goodwin  06:42

I wouldn't say that we actually had a sacrifice when we were selected. The aviation department wanted to be very exhaustive, put everything in there, and then we'll go down from that. So there was a bridge from the parking garage to the terminal, and then there was a tunnel from the parking garage to the terminal. And those were things that were were really nice to have, but they weren't in the initial program, and they understood that we had constraints that we had to work through. So I don't really think that there was sacrifice. You know, we did have to, early on, reduce some of the lounge spaces that the Aviation Department wanted, but then we were able to, you know, as the design progressed and the risks reduced and the savings were there, we were able to put those spaces back in so it really actually turned out to be an initial sacrifice, and then something that was on the it stayed on the list, and we were able to get it back into the program as the job progressed.

Erin Looney  07:30

One of the things, and we were talking about this when you and I were chatting before the interview, one of the things that kept coming up when we were deliberating as a jury was just that human element, the fact these are people who are coming in and using this space in multiple ways from all over the world. And so one of the really powerful things about the design is it centers on community accessibility. What really stood out were things like the sensory room, the quiet room, that accessible connector. Can you talk about those and any other features you want to highlight, and how those priorities influenced teams choices, and then, then let's talk about some of the feedback you're getting for those things.

Mark Goodwin  08:09

How did we get it right? Or how did we start off? I give skidmore owings and merrill and their design team incredible credit for the outreach that we did, the listening that we did our team. We had probably seven or eight different public sessions. Sometimes we had five or 600 people in a single session, and those were listening, you know, those were were public questions and answers and presentations. You know, we were presenting what we were seeing, and we were asking for their input and their thoughts. What meant Kansas City to the audience, and people probably attended and wondered, what, you know, what's it going to matter? We were a team who those comments did matter? We did have to average things out. We had budget constraints, but we really we heard over and over again the ease of the old terminal, and so that was a huge focus. Ease and inclusivity were really big things that we carried through the design. So a couple other features that I particularly like in the airport, there's a space that you can reserve to go into. It's an airplane fuselage, and it's, it's kind of like a museum exhibit. You go in and you are feeling like you're, you're boarding a plane, and you're, you're sitting in it, and then there's a video of your taking off in front of you. So it really gives the experience. It's another thing that the airport included in order to be as inclusive as they can, I think they deliver on being one of the most inclusive airports in the

Erin Looney  09:27

world. That's a really cool idea. My mother is a very nervous flyer. Something like that would probably put her mind at ease. So I imagine a lot of people are really thankful for that particular

Mark Goodwin  09:38

feature. That's exactly what it was for. And the feedback on the inclusive features is very positive. There's another inclusive playground for children, and so there's just a lot of features that are thoughtful. And I think people really appreciate that,

Erin Looney  09:51

yeah, because we know airports are everybody's favorite place to be, and no one's ever stressed out in an airport. Why would you need help? I really thought that was a great. Perspective to take, going into it was being that thoughtful in the design. And on top of that, 80% of the concessions are local. And $320 million went to underutilized business enterprises. The 133 underutilized business enterprises, what did that inclusion, this community, inclusion, this Kansas City, inclusion, look like in practice, and how did you make sure those commitments weren't just numbers on paper?

Mark Goodwin  10:25

Yeah, so the word transformational for the community was used over and over again, and we did set goals, like a lot of projects. Set goals. We did look at those goals differently than a lot of projects, and that we we looked at that we had made a commitment to deliver on those goals, and not just the goals we looked at, we made a commitment to deliver on a transformational project for the passengers, but but also for the construction community and the architecture community and giving them opportunities to grow. That was a mission of the city council when they when they started off on the project, and it was one that we held very close to our heart as we executed the project. And so how do we do it? Instead of just setting goals, I would say, was very intentional on how we set up our procurements, and I think that we put a lot of pressure on our large business partners to include small businesses things that they typically might not do and things that would challenge them. We leaned in hard because we knew it was the right thing to do to give opportunities to smaller businesses. So yes, we had about 254 local trade partners, large and small, and 133 of those were small businesses, and over $300 million of work performed and executed by those small businesses. The other piece that we're proud to have done for the community is not just focusing on the businesses, but on the labor and craft side as well. Our goals for minority and women in the field were 10 and two, and we delivered 22 and 10. So we really far exceeded the minority and women in the workforce. And I give a lot of credit to our union, our trade union partners who helped us achieve and exceed those goals. They were great. They understood the city council's objectives with increasing the workforce diversity and the partnership really, really excelled with the unions and helped us achieve and exceed those goals. What

Erin Looney  12:16

I think is really interesting about this particular piece, especially all the vendors, is for some people, this is their first impression of Kansas City. For some people, it's their only impression they might be stopping layover, and that's it. And so that opportunity for you to really showcase the city in a not a vacuum, but in a space that some people may not get outside of, or when you come to an airport and it just doesn't match the city. It doesn't set a good tone. So this is really great. I mean, you get there and it is Kansas City from your first foot on the ground. I think that's very

Mark Goodwin  12:47

cool. Yeah, we talked a lot about it being the front door. Might not think of cities as having front doors, but that's where so many guests are going to come in. And Kansas City has the opportunity to host some exciting events, including FIFA World Cup in 2026 so that was something that we were talking about, that opportunity towards the beginning of the construction. So world level visitors, you know, they're going to see what Kansas City is. There is a lot of focus in our design on getting it right, not being overly stated, not being something that Kansas City isn't. But the barbecue is a focus, and the sports are a focus, and the art is a focus. And I think those things are well captured in the final product.

Erin Looney  13:27

And that actually brings up a really good point about not just this national stage, which is where my mind was, but this world stage that Kansas City is on, and I will say some of the best food in the country. And I think it's going to be wonderful to see what the reaction to that is when people come in from around the world for the footy, you mentioned the sports and the growth of downtown, this terminal was described as potentially redefining air travel in the Midwest, in an entire region of a huge country. So what do you think that signals about the city's future beyond what you just said, as well as the role of design build and how that will play in Yeah,

Mark Goodwin  14:01

so I've lived in Kansas City for 10 years now, and the growth and the development have been incredible. The airport's a part of that. A lot of other large projects are really driving growth in the community. I think that people are going to see that design build is a good way to get things done. It can help manage risk. It can help deliver faster than other procurement methods, I think the project is is signaling to the country that Kansas City is serious about its its businesses and about its visitors, and it wants to be on the world stage.

Erin Looney  14:33

And with this, I think it will. So one more. Congratulations, single class, it really is a wonderful project, and I'm so so happy to have you come talk to us about it right now. So thank you so much, and let's see what you got coming up next time we're excited and from a project that stood out in every possible way, we move to a story of extraordinary delivery under extraordinary pressure that also stood out in every possible way. This year's chairs award went to the her. Cane Ian, Sanibel Island Access Project, a design build effort that became a literal lifeline when Hurricane Ian hit on September 28 2022 it severed the only link between Sanibel and Captiva and the Florida mainland. Overnight, more than 6400 residents were cut off from food, fuel, medical care, everything they knew, the Florida Department of Transportation and its design build team, a joint venture of superior and de Moya mobilized within days, restoring emergency access almost immediately, re establishing resident travel within 30 days, and ultimately delivering a resilient, re imagined causeway built to withstand the next storm, because, fellow Floridians, you know that next storm is always right around the corner. This project earned a national award of merit and a national award of excellence in transportation, and, of course, the 2025 chairs award chosen by the sitting national DBIA board chair. Quick heads up about this one. We caught this interview right after the ceremony, in the middle of the after party. So yes, the soundtrack includes a little cheering, a bit of chatter and one very determined announcer, but honestly, it captures the moment perfectly in the conversation with superiors Toby Mazzoni and dbias Paul solantrop cuts through the noise, just fine. Good night for you. Excellent project. I was actually really rooting for it. I mean, I'm from Florida, so it was a pretty exciting project to me. Just because I've been through the hurricane, I know what it's like. So your night ended with a merit award in transportation, nominated for Best in process for PDB, and you got the chairs Award, which is a pretty big deal, given that Tom Foley takes the time out of his schedule to choose that and so he really thought through it, and was really impressed with the project. So looking at that, when you think about everything it took to get here, what does this moment and all these awards and nominations mean to you and

Toby Mazzoni  16:59

your team? It's a tremendous honor, and we're very humble for receiving these awards, right? We love it that it shows the hard work and dedication that our team did for this project. But most importantly, it's not about the award. It's about the people of Sanibel Island. You know, we didn't do it for the awards. We didn't do it for, you know, our recognition, or anything like that. We showed up. We've seen people in need, and we reacted to try to get them to what they needed, their homes, their island, their to everything that they needed and was had to get to.

Erin Looney  17:29

And this is the kind of project that you don't really want to have to do, but when you do you better do it right.

Paul Suellentrop  17:36

It's something that you just it's born in you. You just go out there and you just work hard and get everybody together and get so that the people can get back to their houses.

Erin Looney  17:46

Like I said, not in the plan this project. It's not something you wake up thinking, Do you know what I want to do? I want to go clean up after a hurricane. But the reality is, the hurricane hit, you had to come in and you had to do this project. It changed probably your plan as a couple of different companies, different firms. What was it like to come together and mobilize so quickly to get this done?

Paul Suellentrop  18:09

Well, it starts the week before the hurricane hits, so you're already preparing to mobilize once, once it goes through, you're you're there, mobilizing, ready to see what what needs to be done to fix what happened? The reality is, this is

Toby Mazzoni  18:25

an intense undertaking. Whenever you get something like this, you know, like Paul said, it starts. Whenever you see something like this is coming, but, you know, you start trying to prepare, but no one really knows. I mean, you said you're from Florida, you know, they tell you 100 different places this hurricane might hit, but no one ever really knows. And you know, once it hits, then you go into React mode, you know, and try to start responding and helping out wherever you can, calling the owners, calling the people, calling whoever you can, to see where you can chip in and help the most, the whole process with the DBIA, in this progressive design build system that the D O T does help this process, right? So in a normal world, you get a set of plans, you read a set of plans, you study them, and then you go build them. And this one, it was react quickly. So we had us and our team, whether it was the designers, the D O T, the county, the owners, whoever, they all come together as one, and you reacted on the fly. You didn't just sit back and wait for someone else. You did it. You reacted everybody. Come together. You you thought about it. You didn't overthink it. You just just dove right in and started making stuff happen because you knew you had to do it quickly, because you had a lot of people relying on you to make this happen. So the whole process in itself that the d o t chose to use on this one really benefited the community.

Erin Looney  19:44

One of the things that really stood out when we were looking at this project was that you were essentially living on site throughout the whole thing. So talk about what that was like to just to grill your meals together, to stay in trailers and to know that this was your life. It until it was done.

Paul Suellentrop  20:01

You didn't get a lot of sleep. It was long days, strenuous days. You go maybe get three hours at night and come back. We were living within a mile of the job, so we actually was able to get a house that had power and everything. So it's 15 days of excruciating just whatever it

Erin Looney  20:24

took. Who was the best cook?

Paul Suellentrop  20:26

Well, actually, we didn't cook a lot because you didn't have time to cook. We found restaurants that were open within 20 minutes of where the job was, and that's where we actually ate at the same restaurant every night.

Erin Looney  20:39

You don't want to admit everybody was a bad cook, is that what you're telling me

Toby Mazzoni  20:44

to go along with that, though, everything that you take for granted on a day to day basis was not available to any of us, and nothing was open. You didn't have cell phones, you didn't have power you didn't have gas stations, you didn't have Publix you couldn't just run down the street and go to fast food. You know, we had guys even like myself. We would travel out of the area to load up sandwich meat and bread and just basic things like that, and bring them in, you know, every day. And we would lay it all out on a tailgate of a pickup and then haul it out in boats to the guys that were out working in the field, around the clock, day and night, just trips back and forth. You know, that's just one of the many things that we did to try to keep the job pushing forward, so our guys can keep working, but the same time be able to function. Right? You know, we all can't function without the essentials that we need to keep going, whether it's food, water, all those things, none of that was available where we were at. We had to go all out of the out of the area, to get it, have it brought in between our vendors, our people, whoever you know, could chip in from anywhere afar and just drive to us and bring what we needed. You know, that's what we had to do to make it happen. And it was a

Paul Suellentrop  21:51

saving grace. Because when you're out in the field working, and you come in, you're starving, you need water. It was there. It was sitting there, because these guys brought it in.

Erin Looney  22:02

One thing I can say about people from Florida is we do know how to tailgate. So you were already, you know, that was built into this. That was not something you had to learn. Well, final question for you, this is a little more serious. You know, projects like this, they do test everything you have. So, you know, we're talking trust, teamwork, timing. What got your team through the hardest days?

Paul Suellentrop  22:24

The people of Sanibel Island, we actually knew people that lived on it. We'd see them every day. They'd come in and talk to us and help us out. It was all go to get to that thing open so that they can get back to their houses, instead of taking

Toby Mazzoni  22:37

a barge and a boat, just like Paul said, we're a family, you know, it might not just be, you know, my family with my wife and kids, you know, we're a family as a group, as a town, as a community, as a state, right? We all come together because we knew what those people were going through, and we wanted to help them the best we could, right? This whole phase, design, build, you know, that helped a lot of that. It helped speed it up, the whole process. So, you know, those sleepless nights in the early days helped push that along, and it was rewarding when you saw them, people come across the road for the first time in 15 days. You know, they were so thankful, honking the horns, waving flags, crying as they drove by. And it wasn't just even after 15 days. You know, we had other deadlines that we tried to do for them, complete the road by Christmas of the same year, the upcoming year. And we did that, you know, so much and so thankful that even the mayor and the people of the island come and had dinner with us, celebration that we had for the crew and the people that were there working that made all this happen. It was those trying times that made it feel good and rewarding. And then along come 2024, another hurricane season where we got three hurricanes in almost less than a month. That rewarding to see that what we had built lasted right? So that we know that it's going to withstand future hurricanes like Ian or anything else, so that we know that those folks on that island, whether it's Sanibel or Captiva, when a hurricane hits, they're going to be able to get back home the next day when the hurricane passes. That's what gets us through the days. There's no

Paul Suellentrop  24:05

way you could have built that job without face design building. Absolutely no way. What it did is took the chains offices so that we can go out there and do the work and not worry about making sure all the documentation was handled before we started. So it was all it was all negotiated as we went along, and there's no way that we could have done that job without faces. Angle,

Toby Mazzoni  24:27

we like to hear that. I mean, the reality is, when they first put this out for contract, they expected it to be done many years after we get done. I'm sure you read the stuff and it said we got done three years early. That's just the reality of it, when the handcuffs come off and they allow us to act as team members, whether it's not just the contractor, it's the engineers, the D, o, t, everybody to come together and collaborate. It's basically like live streaming on a day to day basis. It's amazing what you can accomplish quickly. That was

Paul Suellentrop  24:56

the biggest joke. Be done by by Christmas. Yeah, be. Done by Thanksgiving, be done by Halloween, be done in 15 days.

Erin Looney  25:04

Yeah. Oh, that's even better. Usually it's be done by Christmas. Oh, maybe New Year's. Oh, maybe Easter. She went the other way. Yeah,

Toby Mazzoni  25:11

just like you said, when they showed up, they didn't expect it to happen, like they did, and the team of everybody is what made it happen. And curations just kept shrinking.

Paul Suellentrop  25:19

It took Lee County. It took Lee Sheriff's Office, everybody that was involved in making sure that we got materials in the quickest way we could. It just wasn't us. It was the whole county.

Erin Looney  25:33

You know, this year, just as a kind of a side thing, there were two hurricanes this year, an Erin and a Melissa. I'm Erin. My sister is Melissa. And we said, I'm sorry, Florida, thankfully we didn't need you to come in and take care of anything on the heels of those but it's good to know that if we do need in the state of Florida, somebody who knows what they're doing, you guys have it down. I mean, the chairs award, big deal. So congratulations, and thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us on your big award

Toby Mazzoni  26:00

night. Thank you. Oh, thank you very much for having us.

Erin Looney  26:03

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Erin Looney  26:30

now let's talk future students, the talented young folks who will replace you one day so you can go happily retire to that cabin in the woods or the cabana on the beach. It's your choice Either way, lucky for you, the future is in good hands. So each year, DBIA challenges student teams nationwide with a unique project in the National Design Build student competition. This time, it was an airport expansion at a major airline hub designed to keep pace with booming population growth and record breaking passenger traffic. So it's complex, it's interesting, and it is realistic. The competition itself has three phases, an RFQ, an RFP, and finally, the top three teams present their projects in front of industry leaders at the annual conference this year. First place went to D and T construction from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo. Second place to Cyprus from the University of Florida, and UFS ASA Richards earned the best individual presenter award. Third place went to pioneer design build from Alfred State College. You can learn more about the National Design Build student competition@dbia.org Now what you're about to hear in these interviews is just a taste. We'll have a full student competition episode in early 2026 with longer interviews, and we'll also talk to the advisors and some of the judges. But for now, here are a few highlights, starting with your champs, the winning team, D and T construction from Cal Poly consisted of Allison Buckholtz, Sergio Gonzalez, Coulter, langmade, Casey Lavin and Jacqueline lamano, their faculty advisor is Tom calmer, who you will hear from in the longer episode. But for now, let's talk to the students. Congratulations. Listen, I'm a gator, and I'm sorry, but congratulations. I truly mean it is a really big thing to take home this prize. And every year, when I talk to the teams, it's just more and more impressive to see what the industry the industry is going to look like going forward. So what do you think, out of all the teams that entered, set your proposal apart and made you rise to the top? Yeah, we did

Speaker 1  28:33

extensive research for two months now. We were even in this project before school even started, during the summer, when I was traveling abroad, people had their internships lined up, and so I think we did a lot of preparation work for it, and then we executed it very well by just like, rehearsing multiple times and just over and over. And we made sure that we knew everything. Like, why something is? We kept asking ourselves, like, why, when, where, how about every single detail of the assignment, so that we knew it by heart. I

Speaker 2  29:06

also think that we all prioritize this and were able to really manage our time well in terms of this and classes going on. I think we were all able to put in a lot of time and keep our schedules flexible in order to meet for an hour and a half in one of the conference rooms or something like that, or go over questions we think they might ask, or like, yeah, 10 hours on a weekend. So I think, you know, it was great that everyone was able to dedicate, like, a whole day if they needed to, for the project.

Speaker 1  29:32

Everybody had a winning spirit as well. When putting together this team, the three of us had asked the question, do you hate to lose, or do you love to win? And everyone hates to lose here. So we were all wanting to go for go for gold.

Erin Looney  29:49

How do you define the difference between those two things among yourself? If

Speaker 3  29:52

you love to win, then you're okay with losing, but if you hate to lose, there's no other option but to win first place. And so our whole. Goal is to set up a team of people who hate to lose because we'll always strive for excellence.

Erin Looney  30:04

I like that. Okay, why don't you tell us, in your words, how you understood this year's project challenge. Talk about the scope. Talk about how you said, this is what we have to do, and here's how we're going to do

Speaker 2  30:15

it. The approach that I took was just, was taking the owner's goals for the project and really dissecting them into actionable items and things we can put into the design, the schedule, the estimate. Because, I mean, in the end, it's it's really all about the owner and what they want and how they want it to be built, scheduled and budgeted. And I think that's kind of how we approached just, you know, how we organized our slides, how we introduced ourselves, putting together our relevant experience was all about making our team the best fit for what the owner wanted, we were

Speaker 4  30:43

also all very successful at shifting our mindset away from this being a student competition, but rather framing it as we are a construction company and we are presenting to a real owner, and so letting our students selves go, and really putting ourselves like what Coulter was saying in the shoes of their things that owners want and need to hear and to have clarification and assurance on. And that's what we're going to provide.

Erin Looney  31:10

And also kind of a live job interview on some level. Yeah, bit of a detour there. Did anybody have the networking that resulted in sharing resumes? Yes, but you're all going to have jobs, and you're all going to be back here. Back here next year, sitting in the audience who's new and who's competed

Speaker 1  31:26

before. So we are all graduating this year, and so you're all graduating. Yes.

Erin Looney  31:31

Anybody looking at grad schools? We'll see none of you. I love how every head shook really, really rapidly,

31:39

maybe thinking about it, but maybe after I

Erin Looney  31:42

get into the industry. Yeah, every industry is a little bit different, but I think universally, I would say that's the best move. Yeah, design, build, as you maybe knew before, but certainly learned through this. It's collaboration, it's leveraging strength, it's figuring out how it all works together. So how did your team make sure everybody's skills were used?

Speaker 1  31:59

Well, Ali and I, being team captains, we wanted the team to not have an authoritative hierarchy. Everybody in the design build team has their own set of skills that they bring, and we're all important. So given that we were able to use the best of our characteristics to make

Speaker 5  32:21

a really good project. Yeah, and to add on to that, it is my first time competing in a competition like this. So having such a supportive team and having them encouraging you to bite the bullet was great.

Erin Looney  32:32

Do you think that you will encourage other people that you run into to do similar things? Or did this turn you off to

Speaker 5  32:39

No, I would definitely encourage other students to do the same thing. I mean, it's real life exposure, like they were saying pressure, and this is something I could see myself doing in the long run, and that I thought that I would never be doing, you know, I joined Cal Poly in construction management. Never thought that I would be, you know, looking to pursue for a job. And, I mean, I loved it. It was fun.

Speaker 3  32:59

Another thing I just wanted to add is that our team really treats each other as if it is design build, you know, like we all know we have our own personal strengths, and we work together and we collaborate, and we build on top of each other, and we help each other grow, and each different little skill and factor of our proposals and qualifications, which I think is just really beautiful, you know, to Like, have so much strength and like collaboration in one team.

Speaker 2  33:23

I also think in creating the team, we were really fortunate, just because of how involved our CM program is. I mean, we were able to interview 2430 we held interviews for the positions like Casey and Sergio. They both interviewed, and we interviewed other architects and other cm majors, and I think everyone's, you know, dedication to wanting to be a part of something like this is a real value to what our program is, and it just allowed us to really form a strong team

Erin Looney  33:52

that is very cool, that you did structured, sort of official interviews. That's excellent. So every competition has the UPS, but it also has the downs. We've been talking about all the great stuff and all the collaboration, and all the, you know, the love and affection. What was the most challenging aspect of this year's project, and what'd you do to keep it from

Speaker 2  34:12

the first sentence? Okay, for me, like the scariest part of the whole thing is before, when you're on stage and you haven't said anything yet, and you're waiting to say those first words, just because, like, that's your introduction. For me, once I said the first sentence, I was like, and I got that, I got through that, and it went well. I was like, Okay, now I can just go sentence by sentence. And I think for me, that was probably the the low. I guess even though it wasn't a low, you know,

Speaker 4  34:40

like I mentioned in preparation, we are, like, working a lot, so time management with school or not even time management, I guess, budgeting, how much to give to school, how much to give to this competition, how do I represent myself and my academics, but also stand there for my team? Was challenging, but a very. Boarding challenge. We laughed a lot, yeah, when we worked together, also

Speaker 1  35:04

during when, when due dates came up, Allison and my call logs were just each other, missed call, Alice and me, yeah. So we were a lot of time went into this, but it wasn't like, oh, I have to do this. It was like, let's do this,

Erin Looney  35:23

even though it sounds like you were dodging each other's calls, which,

Speaker 5  35:28

okay, another challenge was being able to understand everybody's role and kind of what they were putting into it. It adds a lot of value, kind of understanding what the architect does, what the estimator does what our safety person does, our schedule. I know how it all works and how it applies, and just being that backup for you know, hey, maybe this isn't going to work, because my plan is this. So that's another big challenge, is making sure that we're all on the same page and not reciting but that we understand it.

Erin Looney  35:57

So reflecting on this experience now, obviously there's something coming next. What are you going to do with what you've learned? What's next for you all? I heard somebody say, sleep. Make it a little more long term,

Speaker 3  36:09

long term. Sleep for long term goals, I plan on going into semiconductor construction, which, with that, just the nature of the work, you tend to have interesting clients and owners, which I think just from this competition, I mean, design build truly is about, you know, having that collaboration and that relationship with your client and your owners and everyone that's a part of that team. And so I think at least for me, like being a part of this competition and dealing with all of that collaboration is so useful and vital to my success in the future, and being able to have those relationships and conversations with owners.

Speaker 2  36:43

I will be working with whiting Turner up in Seattle on a federal project, and I'm just excited to get my foot in the door and really grow into my career and just see what's nice. I've never lived in Seattle, so it's on the other side of the country from where I'm from. So I mean, it's just, where are you from? New Hampshire. Okay. Oh, yeah, it is, should be, should be a good time. And, yeah, I'm looking forward to it.

Speaker 4  37:06

I'm wrapping up my fifth year architecture thesis, so that'll be done at the end of the year. And I've also just been continuously working towards architecture licensure. I plan on entering the professional industry after graduation and getting

Speaker 5  37:20

licensed. I'm looking to put my head down for a little bit and work, work hard and keep climbing ladders, and once I hit the ceiling, you know, next step, next next move.

Erin Looney  37:29

I noticed nobody said building airports. Yeah. Okay. Well, maybe in a couple weeks, maybe when you all wake up from the long term sleep. Well, congratulations again. It was really a delight to talk to you. And I mean, I love the enthusiasm, and you obviously come across as winners. Take that energy into the field and again, congrats. Thank you from our winning team at Cal Poly, we head to the runners up from the University of Florida, my home state. So yes, I allow myself a little bias, a little favoritism. Cyprus brought serious strategy, energy and a lot of heart to this year's competition. Their team included Elijah John Aidan Newsom, Asa, Richards, Nicholas, solar and Lucas wicks with faculty advisor, Russell Walters. And after the team interview, I also sat down one on one with ASA to talk about the best individual presenter award, congratulations for making it to the finals and for being one of three lucky teams to get to come here and show off what you know in front of a bunch of people who know it just a little bit better than you do right now. What does being a finalist in this recognition mean to your team after months and months of preparation, late nights, I'm assuming, unless you're all early birds, it

Asa Richards  38:43

really means a lot to us. We put in a lot of hard work, and it it goes to show that our hard work didn't go unnoticed, getting an opportunity to present the work that we created in front of all of these judges and industry professionals, to give us real feedback, and it was super amazing experience and a great opportunity for all of us to learn and grow and continue in our careers, and they are sitting

Erin Looney  39:04

there watching their actual replacements. And I think that's

Speaker 6  39:06

really cool. The opportunity to compete in the top three, and like come to Vegas, of course, was a huge reward. I think the sacrifice that we made in terms of, like our time, because this is an optional team for all of us. This is something that we didn't know would be on our plates coming into the semester. And so it was kind of really cool to get to realize all that hard work. Who

Erin Looney  39:24

is new to this competition and who has competed in it before. I'm new to the competition.

Speaker 2  39:30

Yeah, actually, I find this

Erin Looney  39:33

kind of funny, because last year, the winning team was all women, and I'm sitting here looking at their exact opposite. So for all of you, since you haven't done this before, what do you think of the experience, and will you do it again?

Asa Richards  39:48

It was a great opportunity. We learned so much just by doing this presentation and all the hard work and effort we put out, we got a return on it. Got to come to Vegas. Unfortunately, I am a senior, so I won't. Able to do it again. But if this wasn't my first year, I would, I would 100% do it again.

Speaker 7  40:04

I'll add something to it, like going to the expo afterwards. Like, when you compete in this you're like many celebrities, everybody's coming up to talk to you and giving you, like, we had, we had straight half job offers. Like, come on over to me. I get, give me your resumes. I'd love to talk to you more. So it's like, it's a good professional development thing too. That's

Erin Looney  40:22

excellent to hear. I want all of you to get a job out of this, and then you can say you're one of the few people who actually got a job in Vegas and didn't lose a job. So far, we've been talking about the good stuff, but every competition and every team has the bumps, the waves and the things that don't go great. So what was the most challenging aspect of the project for you all this year, and what did you do to get through it? Man, you are itching to grab that microphone. This is where you bear it all. You hate them. You never want to see them again.

Speaker 6  40:50

This is kind of where we show the writing on the wall. So of course, like we all have busy exams and stuff again, this is like an extracurricular activity. Honestly, with how busy all of our schedules were last week, we really didn't get the chance to practice our presentation and a lot of our stuff until about 12 hours before we competed. Is that supposed to go on air?

Speaker 7  41:07

I mean, that's up to you. He and I both had to take exams at 4pm two days ago while we were here. Yeah. Oh, no fun. We had a professor who said, If you can't take the exam, drop the course.

Erin Looney  41:24

Oh my gosh, but you managed to figure it out. It seems like 12 hours of practice got you this far. So that's right. What do you think 48 hours

41:33

you two will have to tell us next year.

Erin Looney  41:36

That's right, because we'll be seeing you again. So final question, reflecting on this whole experience soup to nuts. How do you plan to leverage you hit on this a little bit earlier with the networking in the exhibit hall. How do you plan to leverage what you've learned

Speaker 8  41:50

from this since we're juniors? We actually talked to a lot of companies in that Expo and talked about potential internships and potential work opportunities, and they were all very open to, you know, looking at our resumes and portfolios and potentially taking us as interns in the summer. So we would probably use this experience to really network out there and get as much as many job or internship opportunities in the future.

Speaker 7  42:16

I think it's also always good experience to get some like public speaking and like grilling. And I think that's I got best presenter here to my left. So we're kind of, we're honing that, but I think especially for Nick and Eli, and probably myself, it's, it's good to get the experience of like being asked questions in front of 75 people, or whatever, however many people were in the room doing podcast interviews. Yeah, this is new to me as well.

Erin Looney  42:41

Bonus question, how many of you are from Florida and where? If you are

42:47

north, Miami, Tampa, Tampa, Tampa,

42:50

Gainesville, okay,

Erin Looney  42:52

and you're from where I'm from, Buffalo, New York. I live in Buffalo, really? Yeah, oh my gosh, all right. Well, thank you guys so much for doing this. Obviously, you know, Go Gators. Great to see you all. Take that energy back and tell my state I said you're too hot. So Asa, I have you alone right now to ask you about being the best individual presenter. You know, being under pressure, in front of judges, in front of peers, in front of people who might be your employer someday. What was your mindset when you were going in. What's funny is, last year's looked very cool, and they told her, she her hands in her pockets, and she was very at ease. Turned out she was freezing. So when we asked her, that's what she told us, so what was going through your head and how do you keep your composure and make sure you connect and get all your points across?

Asa Richards  43:36

Public speaking is like inherently difficult to do. You know, it's taken me a lot of time to work on it and improve, but the biggest mindset switch that I had is I know what I'm doing. You know, I've spent countless hours preparing this presentation, working with this team, and I know what I have to say. I know everything I'm talking about. And so I sort of have flipped the switch from I need to say these exact words to here are a few things that I need to talk about, and I actually understand them, and I sort of treat it like I'm just explaining it to my team, because I've done that multiple times when we're going through the slides or our presentation and say, Hey, I'm going to write this bullet point. Here's what I'm going to talk about, and I essentially just try to do that again. That's a super driving factor for my success. But then another thing is the team around me. I know if everything goes wrong, I have four other people that also know what I'm trying to talk about, and can step in and and save me. So there's a lot less pressure on I need to do everything by myself, and it's more on I can say the things that I want to talk about, and if something goes wrong, there's there's people around me to help. I'm going to

Erin Looney  44:41

ask your permission to use what you just said about being the expert to play for my public speaking students, who I tell that all the time. Yeah, I say you're not giving a speech. You're telling people about something you care about. You're the expert on that topic. And I want to use look what happens when you actually put that philosophy to work. So congratulations on that. That's a big. Honor and my favorite part of the student competition, thank you. And rounding out the top three, Pioneer design build from Alfred State College, a team that absolutely earned their spot in Vegas and brought a thoughtful, disciplined approach to the competition. Their lineup included Jessica Budd, Fernanda, seja, Selena, Filon, Owen lantane and Connor Welsh. Their faculty advisor was William Dean, congratulations on getting to the final three. I've heard this was an incredibly tough competition this year, so just being here says you've, you've done something incredible. I mean, that's my perspective. But what's your perspective? What does this recognition mean to your team?

Speaker 9  45:35

For us, really, with this is a, I think, the second time our school is actually qualified for the top three, let alone be able to come to the conference. So for us, it's really impressive. And so the word to say satisfying, I guess, to be able to be sitting here now and getting even top three is such a great honor for us.

Erin Looney  45:54

I would say you're starting a legacy at this point. I think after the first one, it's like, if you do it again, we are also the only team from our school. I know some schools have multiple teams. We are the only team from our school. So I think it's quite an honor to be here.

Speaker 10  46:09

Yeah, it also is great too, because almost all of us are architecture students, and we had to learn new backgrounds on the spot. We don't have the experience a lot of other schools come in and have Alfred State provides us with a really great program where we have a basis of what we need to know, but we came out strong as architecture students and proved that we can do anything any other team can do. Let's

Erin Looney  46:32

talk a little specifically about design, build and the collaboration that is inherent, and how you all leveraged each other's strengths and your own strengths. What did you do to make sure all of your skills were used fully and to create this, in my mind, real successful

Mark Goodwin  46:47

project. The most important thing for us was making sure that we're honest with with our capabilities. When we were really divvying up work and figuring out who should tackle what, we tried to be as completely blunt as possible. And like for the RFP, and the RFQ is like, well, I can't really write that. Really write that well, or I don't know much about a construction background. And then when we got into the design proposal, it came down to me and Celaena doing a lot of the design work and the modeling, while everyone else worked on a lot of the construction. And as well, I'm more familiar with the program, I'm not, and I think that communication, that honesty between us as a team really helped us to work very efficiently together and really make this project as great and as complete as it could

Speaker 10  47:28

be. We also had a lot of meetings, lot of late nights in the studio together, working together. Collaboration was really key, especially when you're working on a group project. It's nice to know like what other people are writing about, per se, you can't just start writing about stuff that you're not seeing in the design or you're not seeing in the schedule. We had weekly meetings, and then we would just meet after studio class for the last few weeks for few hours and try to knock it out together and work as a cohesive team. Final

Erin Looney  47:58

question, reflecting on the experience from above. What do you plan to do next? How are you going to leverage the success for whether it's grad school, early projects, your next step in the career, at least

Speaker 10  48:08

for me, graduating in May, I think the most important thing for me is to find a firm that aligns with my values and takes my design and architectural background seriously. I really am striving to go for my architectural license pretty quickly after I graduate. So for me, that's probably the most important thing on the horizon, trying to get that done and just learn as much as possible as I can. Young. I really like to keep it open and try to do a bunch of different architecture projects, whether that's K through 12, healthcare, government, work or community centers. So really, just trying to get a feel for what architecture really is and what it can be as the future.

Speaker 11  48:51

I agree with all of that, but also, like you said earlier, starting a legacy for our school. I mean, we're the second group to come and be able to present at this conference. And it's been amazing. Would be even cooler if we can come back again next year. So hopefully, yes, that's a big part doing this again. And whether it's, you know, another terminal expansion, the John Dutton Airport's gonna get really big. It's gonna get real big if it keeps, keeps growing. But, or, I know, I think what two years ago, they did kind of like a higher ed but was like a sports

Erin Looney  49:21

facility. We started building this airport last year, so

Speaker 11  49:25

maybe another terminal, I don't know. Maybe we'll do a hotel, I don't know. Okay, but, you know, just trying to get all the experiences and see how far we can go, we want to build a good platform for Alfred. We love to represent Alfred. We want to bring up the generations after us. Have them keep doing this. We want to show them that even though we didn't get first, this is still a great opportunity, and we're going to do it again, because no matter what, it's an amazing experience.

Speaker 10  49:48

I also think, as a smaller school, this is a really great opportunity. We came here and people are like, Oh, where are you from? And we're st Alfred State College, and no one really. Knows where that is, but it provides a great program for its architecture students. And I think we really proved that the past few years, coming in here as strong as we did, and being able to go up against some of these bigger colleges and really be like, hey, Alfred is up there with you guys. Watch out. Here we come.

Erin Looney  50:19

I would say you guys have put the school on the map, and I think that's the legacy we keep talking about. But I think now that you've done that, and people can see the quality of student who is coming out of there, you know, you're really setting a new standard for where people are looking for their next generation of talent. So excellent job. Congratulations,

Speaker 10  50:34

guys. You can follow us at Pioneer, Dot Design, dot build, if you want to check out some of the work we did for this competition. Thank you. Everybody do that.

Erin Looney  50:43

And that's part one of our 2025, Design Build Conference and Expo recap from Las Vegas. It was a lot of fun reliving it with you. Big thanks to every guest who sat down with us, even with the conference, doing its absolute best to provide you know, let's call it color commentary if you're already thinking ahead to what's next, because, you know, we always are. Dbias event lineup is posted at dbia.org/conferences, you'll find dates there for the spring specialty conferences, water, wastewater and transportation in Grapevine, Texas, plus next year's design, Build Conference and Expo in Cleveland. Mark your calendars now, so you're not scrambling later next month. In part two of our recap, we're moving from winning teams to winning people with interviews from our 2025 Distinguished Leadership Award honorees Janice Zahn, Britt Sanford, David shadport and Jennifer max and the 2025 Brunelleschi Lifetime Achievement Award recipient Phil riestek. And who knows, maybe, maybe I will share the slot machine story with you, then I probably won't. I'm Aaron Looney, thanks for listening to the design build delivers podcast brought to you by arkons and Autodesk Platinum Partner. Learn more at arkons.us/dbia