OEDK reopens after basement expansion

By Jieya Wen     9/11/13 7:00pm

The Oshman Engineering Design Kitchen held an open house Sept. 7 to celebrate the renovation of its basement, which added 6,000 square feet of usable space, according to Director of the OEDK Maria Oden.

"The expansion of the OEDK is to better serve the need of students. We added 26 tables for [project] teams in the basement and quadrupled the electronic working area," Oden said. "We added a new, larger conference room and computer lab. We added one faculty member, two staff members and a technician to help students. The renovation itself cost $1.2 million. The original OEDK cost about $5 million."

Associate Director of the OEDK Amy Kavalewitz said planning for the expansion started in January 2013 and construction, which took about three months, began after commencement in May. Kavalewitz said the OEDK received $600,000 for the project from the Asset Liquidation Funds Appropriations Committee, which allocated proceeds from the KTRU sale.

---

---

Professor of electrical and computer engineering and of computer science Joseph Cavallaro said the larger space will allow more students to have the chance to experience engineering design.

"The opening of the basement offers space for more students, and it will certainly lead to better engineering performance," Cavallaro said. "Major facility upgrades, such as the 3-D printer, will help students to create more interesting prototypes as well." 

Director of the OEDK Maria Oden said the OEDK would catch up with students' growing interest in engineering and better accommodate students' needs in the future.

"We are adding more equipment in [the] machine shop, a [computer numerical control] mill and a laser cutter," Oden said. "We are also setting up electronic stations to provide opportunities for more students to have hands-on engineering experience."

OEDK Engineering Design Technician Carlos Amaro said students are already benefiting.

"There is a new section for ENGI 120: Intro to Engineering Design and its continuation class, ENGI 300: Engineering Design Workshop," Amaro said. "If every design team gets a table, we'll have 60 of our 65 tables occupied."

Ronnie Featherston, the Schools of Natural Science and Engineering liaison for Facilities Engineering and Planning, said the OEDK has an extraordinary history and that this expansion is a fresh start.

"Before the 1980s, the OEDK was actually the central kitchen," Featherstone said. "Cooks ... prepared the meals in the kitchen, and the meals were sent to the eight colleges. However, in the mid-'80s, colleges started the satellite kitchens, and the central kitchen was abandoned. [Since then], only the Marching Owl Band used the basement for rehearsing. Five or six years ago, the [George R. Brown] School of Engineering renovated [the] building and made it what it is today."

Rice Solar Car President Juan Borbon said the capabilities of the new OEDK would allow project teams to do more work in-house.

"Previously, we had to outsource a lot, Borbon, a Jones College junior, said. "Doing stuff in-house saves us money and time between conceptualization and production, allowing for iteration."

---