PENANG, 29 Sept. 2014 – A group of students from Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) School of Housing, Building and Planning (HBP) and School of Civil Engineering (CE) has made the university proud when they won the 3rd prize at the Open Idea Competition (OIC) 2014 held in Kuala Lumpur recently.

This prestigious competition was organised by the Malaysian Structural Steel Association (MSSA) and Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB) in conjunction with International Construction Week 2014 which was attended by professionals from the construction industry, government sector, and academia.

For winning the 3^rd prize, the USM team took home cash prize of RM5,000 and was celebrated in special luncheon with the media.

The winning group was represented by Muhammad Firdaus Bin Ariffin, Beh Hong Bing, Jonathan Tin Yuan Jong and Suhailah Bt Hamizo from Architecture Programme, the School of Housing, Building and Planning, and Siti Syahirah Bt. Rahim and Teng Jun Geng, from the School of Civil Engineering.

The group was supervised by Dr. Wan Mariah Wan Harun from School of HBP. Other lecturers involved were Assoc. Prof. Dr. Aldrin Abdullah (Dean, School of HBP), Prof. Dr. Ahmad Farhan Mohd Sadullah (Dean, School of CE), Dr. Fatimah Denan, Dr. Mazran Ismail, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ahmad Sanusi Hassan and Assoc. Prof. Dr. Taksiah A Majid.

The aim of this competition is to bridge the gap between the teaching of architecture and structural engineering. This year’s MSSA/CIDB student competition required the students to design the Innovative Community-Disaster Convertible Centre (iC-Dcc).

The original concept of iC-Dcc is to provide a one-stop multi-purpose community centre for the residents of a village, suburb, and town to take shelter or refuge when a disaster strikes.

On regular days, it functions like any other community centre, but once a disaster (flood/haze/storm/ landslide/epidemic) strikes, it can be immediately turned into a disaster relief facility. It must be able to serve as both a ‘Transitory Accommodation for Disaster Victims’ as well as an ‘Operation and Distribution’ base.

Translation: Tan Ewe Hoe/Text: Marziana Mohamed Alias