Re:Post (Regarding Publication Opportunities Show and Tell) will be featuring ongoing work by Waterloo students who are presenting or exhibiting at conferences. The posts are intended to both communicate the research that UWSA students are presenting and describe the conference experience. This post is the second of the series, written by Andrea Murphy, who successfully defended her thesis on Wednesday May 15th.
Reclaim + Remake Symposium
April 11-13, Washington, DC
The Conference: The Catholic University of America hosted a conference entitled “Reclaim & Remake Symposium” in early April. It was the first of its kind, bringing together interested parties to discuss the value of waste as a resource, mostly in the realm of construction waste, but carrying over into other types as well. Papers were presented as well as posters in the School of Architecture on their Washington DC campus. Their studio space, like ours, is a reused building… it was once an airplane hangar, then a gymnasium, and now a lofty (yet chaotic) two-level studio space. There was talk of making this a regular event, annually, or semi-annually, but nothing was confirmed.
For a full schedule and abstracts, click here.
The Paper: I presented a paper there based on part of my thesis work. The word count was restricted to 3000 words, so that definitely prevented me from covering as much as I wanted… which is good to keep in mind when submitting abstracts to become papers. Don’t get too ambitious with the abstract because you might not be able to cover it all within the word count restriction! The presentation with 30 minutes, with a Q&A period afterwards. My work, although outside of the construction/demolition and reused building material topic, was well received and I fielded more questions than anyone else on my panel. This lead to some great discussions with other attendees later during the breaks, especially the Canadians. I was able to connect with students from Ryerson University who are also interested in the field of waste reclamation, as well as attendees from across the continent.
Overall, it was a great experience, not just because the conference went well, and my presentation was well received, but also because Washington DC in early April is beautiful! The weather was excellent and the cherry trees were blooming.
