Graduate / MS Engineering Construction Management - Statement of Purpose [4]

Hello! I have an Bachelor of Architecture from a Mexican university, and am now applying to engineering construction management master's programs in the USA. I need to write a 1000 word statement of purpose, and I was wondering if you could do me a favor by reading it over. I'm not sure if it's too wordy, or if everything is relevant as I'm changing careers. Thank you for your time and help!

In 2011, while living in London and working for a Parisian architecture firm, I made a realization that changed the trajectory of my career. The firm focused on esoteric, theoretical design, but I became an architect to build and tangibly improve the world, to build efficiently and cost-effectively without hurting functionality or beauty. My answers lie in understanding construction and structural engineering, so I studied math, physics and engineering software.

I have developed my goals further: to join the construction industry and become an expert in building high rises, innovating new technologies and combining them with creative design in order to make architecture more affordable for families and small businesses. Earning an M.S. in Engineering and Project Management is an important step to achieving this goal. Having a solid understanding of efficient project management, combined with my architecture degree, will enable me to connect feasibility and affordability throughout the design, planning, and execution stages.

As an architecture undergraduate student in Tijuana, the busiest border city in the world, research projects shaped my ethos to design for improved quality of life. One such project, overseen by Professor Aaron Gutiérrez and entitled Interstices: Dynamic Uses of Space and Time, focused on the urban behavior between San Diego and Tijuana. We dissected Tijuana to understand its problems caused by the constant massive influx of people crossing both sides of the border, analyzing border culture and data to present solutions. I was involved in all aspects of the project, researching data, metrics and statistics concerning the border, filming the point of crossing at all times and days of the week. Along the queue of border crossers, we observed service providers for government visas, taxis, souvenirs, and taquerías. I then analyzed this mountain of data and used the results to design a multi-purpose space responsive to complex pedestrian life, providing infrastructure that morphed according to changing requirements throughout the day. Although the project was never built, it taught me the complexities of designing multifunctional spaces for a community of people.

My current job, Engineering Intern for an innovative aerospace company, has vastly expanded my knowledge of feasibility and design. I run the company's 3D printer and use the Computerized Numerical Control (CNC) machine, reading engineering blueprints to create parts out of various materials.These blueprints are brilliant but I must still adapt them to each real world application. I then see the adjustments the engineers make in their redesigns, observing how small tunings resonate into large changes. I see parallel opportunities in construction, which has greatly impacted my master thesis project. Using new technology, a variety of different parts could be made at the same rate as mass produced parts. I wish to employ this concept in the building industry by developing it further in my master's thesis as well as in my career.

For my master's thesis, I would like to solve a problem that has bothered me since I began studying the low-income tract housing that has overtaken Tijuana's hills. The families who live there depend on the border and the US/Mexico relationship for income, but due to outward expansion, they live far from work. Like many communities worldwide, as the workers leave every day, their homes remain unprotected and their children unattended. The children do not have community activities or transportation away from the neighborhood, so they are trapped with little to do. Such are the problems with horizontal expansion, especially in underserved communities. By utilizing vertical expansion and high rises to create fully integrated communities, closer home/work relationships can be developed, reducing automobile reliance and improving community connectivity. Horizontal expansion is a modern idea, proposed by Le Corbusier's philosophy to separate home, work, and play, and propelled forward by the advent of automobiles and highways. The cost-effectiveness of building horizontal makes it attractive; land is relatively cheap in comparison to expensive structural elements and machinery required of vertically extended buildings. My thesis will address how to make vertical expansion as inexpensive and viable as its horizontal counterpart. My approach is to combine mass production first employed by Henry Ford, with mass customization, creating repetitive prefabricated pieces that interlock onsite into modules to form beautiful, well-crafted buildings. Recently I used the 3D printer to craft my modular building prototype for inexpensive housing, then I presented my model and concept to a well-respected architecture firm in Tijuana. Their enthusiastic response has encouraged me to pursue this path of blending architecture with construction and engineering. For this modular design I developed a set of rules, inspired by the research of David Newton, who focuses on leveraging digital technology to produce architectural designs that approach the efficiency and beauty of natural systems. "Natural systems, like plants," Newton says, "are composed of modular building blocks, which give plants a regularity of sorts, but at the same time, they generate a wide range of variation...in response to environmental factors." My various prototypes look quite different from one another, yet follow the same construction concept and parameters: every angle must have both a structural and aesthetic purpose, saving costs while creating beautiful environments. One large, tessellating piece serves as the floor, walls, and ceiling, yet can be customized to accommodate various living and working situations - mass customization.

I am excited to be alive in this era of pioneering technologies. I see from my experience and education how technology will change architectural design and construction. I firmly believe in my proposed research topic, and I hope to use it to advance architectural design technologies.