Whiting- Turner is a contracting company based on construction job sites influenced and rooted in engineering. “Whiting and LeBaron Turner founded The Whiting-Turner Contracting Company in 1909 on the belief that integrity, engineering talent, and a dedication to our customers would make Whiting-Turner the very best in the construction industry. For more than a century, Whiting- Turner’s success and reputation in the marketplace have been testaments to their wisdom.” (http://www.whiting-turner.com/) Did you know that Whiting-Turner constructed the Loch Raven dam for the Reservoir near NDP in 1922? They have contributed a vast amount throughout Maryland.

This summer, I interned with Whiting-Turner for a week. We shadowed other Whiting-Turner employees and learned the ropes of their jobs. The first two days of the week, two other NDP girls and I visited Sinai Hospital on Northern Parkway. We met with one of the women engineers and shadowed her for two days. Whiting-Turner was just finishing the project at Sinai, and we were able to see the very end of the project. We got to see all the plans and diagrams of the building. At Sinai they were adding more operating rooms. It was very interesting to see the whole process, and it helped me to understand how much goes into design and build. We were able to work and get a taste of being a project engineer (one of the facets in engineering).

The next three days, we worked at Mercy Hospital in Baltimore City. I had never realized how big Mercy Hospital was and how much Whiting-Turner has contributed to the work. We saw many different areas that were under construction and rooms that were under construction. While at Mercy, we toured the hospital and got a better understanding in mechanical, electrical, civil, and architectural engineering. Also, we learned about the bidding process. The bidding process in engineering is when many other contractors bid to do the electrical, mechanical, duct work, etc. They all bid prices that they could work with, and the project engineer’s job is to choose which contractor will do the work. Time, quality and money are all factors when taking on such big projects

Internships are a great way to experience options you may want to go into for the future. After this shadowing internship, I have grown to understand engineering even better and definitely think it could be an option for the future. Internships are a great way to learn about the job and yourself, and I definitely recommend an internship for the summertime. I learned so much in that week, and I cannot wait to apply what I have learned in the future.