Every summer, Sabre Commercial transforms into a training ground for young adults with an interest in the construction industry. Currently, our five 2019 interns are avidly shadowing project managers, estimators, project engineers and superintendents to experience what a commercial GC is all about.

The experience is designed to give participants real-world experience and practical insight into their chosen field. Gregory Kimpler, a Mechanical Engineering major at UT Austin, has been interning on the site of our HVAC renewal project at The University of Texas Music Recital Hall (MRH). Two things he’s learned already—safety is paramount on an occupied campus and without careful consideration, unexpected surprises can compromise a schedule.

“It was interesting being in coordination meetings to carefully plan power outages, large equipment deliveries, and crane lift plans to ensure safety and minimal impact to daily activities on the UT campus,” he said. “Something surprising was seeing the difficulties associated with performing a renovation on a building originally built in the 1960s. There were a lot of unknowns that appeared during the course of construction that were not specified in the original building plans. These unknowns were carefully analyzed and required creative solutions to stay on schedule.”

Part of Gregory’s time has been spent with Sabre’s Allyssa Taylor, who is helping to lead the UT MRH project. Allyssa is a testament to the possibilities of the internship since she joined Sabre in 2015 after completing a summer internship while earning her Architectural Engineering degree at UT. Initially excelling as Project Engineer on a wide range of tenant improvement and ground-up projects, Allyssa is now transitioning into project management. A number of Sabre team members were first introduced to the company via the summer program, including Sabre Superintendent Trey Batey, Project Engineer Brandon Klotz, and Project Engineer Carter Cole.

According to Director of Human Resources Suzanne Simpson, we plan to recruit our 2020 group of Sabre summer interns through a combination of spring and fall college job fairs and personal referrals. “We take these paid internships very seriously, both in terms of providing an authentic experience and having real work expectations,” she said. “Each intern is assigned to a project and is assigned daily tasks. They sit in on important meetings with subcontractors, owners and architects, and get a real feel for the day-to-day rhythm and responsibilities of a construction worksite.”

This year’s group of four college students and one high school graduate are getting some cross-disciplinary exposure as we partner with the internship programs of Pape-Dawson Engineers and CTA Architects. Interns from each of the programs will visit the other two companies to attend joint Lunch and Learns on relevant topics. This provides the 17 participants with additional information and opportunities to network with like-minded peers.

“The impetus for this ‘series’ was a conversation at a ULI Breakfast between Todd Reimers, Sheri Blattel – Principal of CTA Group, and myself,” said Su Kosub of Pape-Dawson Engineers. “We were discussing our Summer Interns and how our respective programs were going. Sheri mentioned that she ‘wished they were more familiar with the whole process, not just the architectural side.’ So, seeing as we had the Architect, the Engineer, and the Contractor, in the conversation, we decided to give this a try. Todd sent an email out the next day with dates, and here we are!

And as I mentioned, I think we’re on to something. The 30 minutes prior to the LnL was great – lots of conversations, talk about school, work, etc. And I overheard one saying it was ‘nice to be around young people!'”

“We thought we’d try to take some of the mystery out the process,” said Todd Reimers, Principal and Chief Business Development Officer. “This way Sabre interns gain exposure to three different industry disciplines, and can get a sense of how they work together.”

Sabre Commercial’s 2019 interns include:

• Grayson Dippel studying at Montana State University
• Gabriella Kackley studying at The University of Texas at Austin
• Greg Kimpler studying at The University of Texas at Austin
• Keller Kosub recent graduate of Austin High School
• Jackson Reimers studying at Blinn College