CAWP Student Estimating Competition

In this episode of Constructing Connections, Rich Barcaskey is joined with Kevin Duris, the Assistant Chief Estimator from Trumbull Corporation, who has played a vital role in the CAWP Student Estimating Competition for the past nine years.  

The competition, which recently took place from February 20th to 22nd, 2025, featured 11 teams from seven universities, where students estimated costs for a local highway project, compared subcontractor quotes, and presented their findings to a panel of judges. This episode highlights the key skills students gain and emphasizes the competition's role in fostering interest in the highway industry and preparing students for future careers. 

Transcript

Rich Barcaskey: [00:12 – 00:22] Hello, everyone, and welcome to Constructing Connections. My name is Rich Barcaskey, and with me today is Kevin Duris, Assistant Chief Estimator from Trumbull Corporation. Welcome, Kevin.  

Kevin Duris: [00:22 – 00:23] Glad to be with you, Rich.  

Rich Barcaskey: [00:23 – 01:16] Kevin has been an instrumental part of the Association's yearly student estimating competition since its inception nine years ago. In February, CAWP hosted the ninth annual student estimating competition. Eleven teams from seven universities participated in the competition. This year, the participants were student teams from Bucknell University, Carnegie Mellon University, Penn State University Harrisburg, Penn State University - University Park, and the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown, and finally, West Virginia University. As you know, the Student Estimating Competition was developed to showcase the benefits and opportunities the heavy highway construction industry has to offer. So, Kevin, could you expand on the different ways contractors and volunteers assist in pulling off this competition? 

Kevin Duris: [01:16 – 02:33] Sure Rich, so we choose a local highway project that the students estimate the cost for like 16 bid items. They compare quotes for 30 items, choose a low responsible subcontractor out of those quotes, and incorporate their 16 bid items into the project schedule. We also give them 20 questions to answer and with that they have to tell us where they found the answer. We give them a special problem anywhere from a crane lift, the tabulating quantities for like a stream diversion or a temporary bridge deck, and then they give a presentation to a panel of judges. It's about a 20-minute presentation. The judges score the students on a work scale about 250 points. The competition starts Thursday evening, goes from 8 a.m. to 5.30, so it's on Friday. It's pretty much an all-day affair on Friday, and then Saturday they give their presentations from 8 to 3.30. There's also a career fair, which is good for the students. The winning team is announced on Saturday, and they receive a check of $1,500. That is split between all the team members, and we even give a second place of $1,000. Contractors can offer up one of their projects to be used in the competition, and they would provide the mentors. They could also provide mentors and judges. Most of these mentors and judges repeat their services. the following years and then we also give the opportunities for the contractors to set up a booth at the career fair on Saturday. 

Rich Barcaskey: [002:23 – 02:45] Great and you've served both as a team advisor and now as the technical advisor overseeing the entire competition. What have you learned in your role about the estimating competition and how it benefits students? 

Kevin Duris: [02:46 – 04:07] Well I mentored the CMU students and they do not get a lot of exposure to the construction management and estimating I had to basically start at the ground floor in my mentoring sessions, considering most of the CMU students are not from the United States. One question that I got from the students was I told the group that the project will either be a PennDOT or a Turnpike project. One student Raise their hand and ask what is a turnpike so I had to start from the ground floor obviously and mentoring, but the students were eager to learn. There's also a difficult time during coven students were at home. They were not on campus. We had virtual classes and we all know that. in-person learning is better. We had to determine the convenient time to meet and considering that students were on different time zones, like China was 13 hours ahead of us, India was 10 and a half hours ahead, Japan was 14, so we decided on 6 p.m. as the most reasonable time. Now, as a general advisor, I've noticed that schools with the most exposure to construction and estimating have an edge. Most winning teams have students that have competed in the past and students with internships within the highway industry also have an advantage. This year we had Penn State, Maine win for the third time in a row because of the above, but we consider all students as a winner. 

Rich Barcaskey: [04:07 – 04:11] What are some interesting things you have witnessed over the past nine years? 

Kevin Duris: [04:11 – 05:21] So, I got a good feel story. So, during my years of mentoring, I was walking across the Clementi Bridge one day after dropping my vehicle off to get inspected, and I was stopped on the bridge by an individual and asked, are you Kevin Dorris? Surprised by the question and not recognizing the person, I said yes. He explained that he competed in the CAWP estimating competition three years ago, And I was their mentor. So he thanked me for the mentoring efforts and told me he just landed a job with the Allegheny Department, County of Engineers. So I thought that was a pretty cool thing. This year's competition, we had an interesting quirk when the CMU team turned in a bid form with an extremely high price, like $22 million. Well, really, their bid was $2.2 million because they're Excel formatted in an India language, and the commas go in a different spot. They go three digits, comma, two digits, comma, and then three digits. So $22 million was really $2.2 million. So it took us a while to figure that out, but you learn something new every day. 

Rich Barcaskey: [05:21 – 05:33] And certainly, the global impact of students that are coming from all over the world is an interesting component of it. What are the main benefits the industry gains by sponsoring this competition? 

Kevin Duris: [05:34 – 05:46] I guess exposing students to the highway industry in hopes of them taking an interest, either working for a contractor to build a project, a designer to design it, or an owner who pays to get it done. 

Rich Barcaskey: [05:46 – 05:52] And what are some of the key life and business skills that the students come away with from this competition? 

Kevin Duris: [05:53 – 06:17] Yeah, so teamwork and time management are one of the key business skills that students come away with. This year, we witnessed half the teams didn't communicate well on the special problem, which was figuring out what crane to use. And then they didn't talk to the person that was actually pricing up the item on which crane to use. So they learned that communication between all team members is very important. 

Rich Barcaskey: [06:18 – 06:22] And lastly, what's coming up for the 10th anniversary of the Estimating Competition? 

Kevin Duris: [06:23 – 06:58] Well, certainly it's a milestone for the event. We are planning to have the event at the same place, same format. We say if it's not broke, don't fix it. Although we are thinking of maybe switching the time back to the September to November time frame instead of October to February, trying to squeeze it in between home football games at Pitt and Penn State. So, we saw a lot of issues with students in the mentoring sessions from fall to spring, that there's not a good continuity there because classes change. So we're looking at maybe moving that time frame. 

Rich Barcaskey: [06:59 – 07:28] Gotcha. For our listeners, if you want to learn more about the CAWP estimating competition, you can check out the recap on our website, cawp.org. And if anyone listening is interested in getting involved in the estimating competition, please reach out to us. Kevin, we really appreciate you sharing your experience and involvement with the CAWP Student Estimating Competition. Thank you all for listening to Constructing Connections.