Construction Management

Larry C. Muszynski is an Associate Professor in the M.E. Rinker, Sr. School of Construction. Management. He received his Ph.D. in Civil Engineering from Purdue University in 1978. Since his time as a tenure-track assistant professor and tenured associate professor in M.E. Rinker, Sr. School of Construction Management, his teaching duties over the last 24 years have been in the area of the “structures” group.  These classes consist of construction materials; mechanics; concrete construction and formwork; and soils and foundations. He has revised the BCN 1210, Construction Materials class to focus on the materials of construction such as soils, concrete, asphalt, timber, masonry, steel and sustainable practices for each of these materials.  This past semester he has developed a new class called ‘The Building Envelope’ that evolved from the previous ‘Roofing Class’ that covers the all of the elements of a building envelope that are exposed to the outside environment.

He has been teaching BCN 3223, the Soils and Concrete Construction class that requires students to work in groups during seven different laboratory exercises and manages a Ph.D. student as the laboratory supervisor. He works with the American Concrete Institute, the Florida Department of Transportation and the Florida Concrete Products Association to make the laboratory exercises relevant to the real world of construction. His areas of research include: cement and concrete material properties, utilizing waste materials in blended cements, chemical and mineral admixtures, sustainable concrete, and corrosion of steel in concrete.

He has been an effective advisor and mentor to both undergraduate and graduate BCN students. He encourages and helps students procure internships and permanent jobs with organizations that he has had contact with and helps students determine what they want to do in life and instruct them on how they might get there.

Research Interests: Aerial and ground robots, AI integration in construction work and education, technology-supported education innovation, VR/AR/MR, human-robot interaction, safety

Biography: Dr. Masoud Gheisari is the Director of Graduate Programs & Research and an Associate Professor in the M.E. Rinker, Sr. School of Construction Management at the University of Florida. He leads the Human-Centered Technology in Construction (HCTC) research lab: https://hctclab.dcp.ufl.edu/. His research focuses on the theoretical and experimental investigation of human-robot interaction in construction and technology-supported education innovation. He earned his Ph.D. in Building Construction (2013) from the Georgia Institute of Technology. To date, he has authored more than 150 peer-reviewed papers in the fields of virtual/augmented/mixed reality (VR/AR/MR) and safe human-drone/robot interaction in construction.

His work has received support worth over $3m in grants from external funding agencies, including the National Science Foundation (NSF), U.S. Department of Labor, NIOSH’s Center for Construction Research and Training (CPWR), National Center for Construction Education and Research (NCCER), and ELECTRI International. Dr. Gheisari’s contributions to research and teaching have earned him numerous awards, including the Associated Schools of Construction (ASC) International Outstanding Researcher Award (2021), ENR Southeast’s Top Young Professional (2020), Russell J. Alessi ELECTRI International Early Career Award (2018), and ASCE ExCEEd Fellowship (2015), among others. He is also an Associate Editor for ASCE’s Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering and serves as the Secretary of the Education Committee within the ASCE Computing Division.

Externally Funded Research Projects:

• Go to Dr. Gheisari’s funding page

Publications:

• Go to Dr. Gheisari’s publication page
• Go to Dr. Gheisari’s Google Scholar page

Future Students: Strongly motivated students are always invited to join HCTC Lab. Please email Dr. Gheisari at masoud@ufl.edu with a current CV and a statement of research interest.

Further information about our ongoing research is available on our research lab website: Human-Centered Technology in Construction (HCTC) Lab

Dr. Bryan Franz is an Assistant Professor of Construction Management at the University of Florida.  He is a researcher and educator dedicated to improving the project delivery process in the building construction industry.  Specifically, he studies organizational strategies for assembling, managing, and evaluating successful project teams.  These strategies include the use of collaborative delivery methods, such as Design-Build and Integrated Project Delivery, the modeling of project communication networks, and the identification of the relational competencies needed for future project managers.  He has published over 30 journal articles, technical reports and conference proceedings in this field.  Dr. Franz is the currently the instructor for Introduction to Construction Management (BCN 3027C) and Construction Capstone (BCN 4787C).  He earned a B.S. (2005), M.S. (2011) and Ph.D. (2014) in Architectural Engineering from the Pennsylvania State University.

Dr. Jeffrey Lindsey holds a Doctorate of Philosophy in Instructional Technology/Adult Education from the University of South Florida. He began his educational endeavors at the University of Cincinnati in Fire Engineering Technology. He couples this with his experience in the fire service from Carlisle, PA. Philadelphia, PA. Largo, FL. And finally, as fire chief in Estero, FL has given him many years’ experience in the industry with real life experience.

He specializes in emergency services administration, management of personnel and major scenes, education, and emergency and disaster response. Both his strong management and leadership background combined with extensive academic excellence makes him an ideal director of the FES program. He has extensive teaching experience in leadership, professional development, emergency management, EMS, fire services, education, and disaster response. He has taken a keen interest of specializing in health and wellness of fire and EMS personnel.

He has published numerous texts in fire and EMS and has served as a past Columnist for Fire Rescue 1 and JEMS publications. He has written many research papers. Served as a State, National, and International speaker at various conferences. He is a subject matter expert for investigative reports and legal cases involving emergency services.

Dr. Edward Minchin is currently Professor at the M.E. Rinker Sr. School of Construction Management at the University of Florida.  In a 34-year career, Dr. Minchin has worked as part of eight major areas of the construction process.  He has been a laborer, construction contractor, designer, inspector, construction owner, researcher, consultant, and adjudicator.

After earning Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Civil Engineering from the University of Florida, Dr. Minchin worked as a construction estimator for Couch Construction Company in Tampa, and later for the Florida Department of Transportation, where he rose to the position of Chief Area Construction.  After 14 years in industry, he obtained a PhD in Civil Engineering from The Pennsylvania State University, and a Master’s degree in Liberal Arts from Harvard University.

Dr. Minchin has over 140 publications, including two books, and seven book chapters.  He served as External Examiner, and committee member for a doctoral thesis in the Department of Civil Engineering; Universitat Politecnica de Valencia, Valencia, Spain, as well as Northeastern University.  He currently simultaneously holds three professorships:  the UF Term, UF Research Foundation, and Holland Professorships.  He has served as was a Visiting Scholar at Northeastern University in 2015-16, and was selected as a Keynote Speaker at four international Construction Conferences in the last 10 years, in Panama, China, Canada, and Thailand.