AN EDUCATIONAL PROJECT TO SUPPORT BIM SKILLS OF CIVIL ENGINEERING STUDENTS

In Slovakia, the Building Information Modelling (BIM) technology is no more taken as only a breakthrough technology for building industry development. It is increasingly considered as an inevitability throughout all building project lifecycle. Therefore, there is an expanding trend of new positions in construction companies like BIM managers and BIM coordinators. Hence, BIM education and development of BIM knowledge and skills should play a significant role in engineering studies. In other words, educational institutes play a key role in preparing the graduates with the required skills needed for BIM tasks and solutions. The BIM skills and competencies as a topic is of expanding interest and various universities in the world over are currently being undertaken for effective and active integration with engineering studies. Likewise, integrating the BIM knowledge and skills into the conventional teaching at the Faculty of Civil Engineering in Košice - Slovakia, reflects the demands of the construction enterprises for high quality both technical and application skilled engineers.

The submitted paper focuses on introducing and explaining the currently ongoing educational project aimed at developing and supporting BIM skills of students in the Faculty of Civil Engineering in Košice - Slovakia. The objectives of the presented and discussed project are oriented on better understanding of BIM skills requirements for the construction sector and on assisting in implementing the BIM skills-oriented topics in the educational curricula in the faculty. Various encouraging and incentive activities included in the educational project and methods and practices of their performance are described in the paper. Moreover, all intended realization outcomes of the project are mentioned and characterised and a proposal of the procedure to achieve tangible and intangible goals of the project is presented.