August 18, 2023
Loughmiller receives visionary award
Katie Loughmiller, associate professor in the GE Johnson Department of Architectural Engineering and Construction Science, was awarded the Carol A. Kueker Construction Education Visionary Award from the National Association of Women in Construction Education Foundation at the organization's annual conference on Aug. 11 in Portland, Oregon.
The award recognizes an individual who has worked aggressively to promote construction as a viable career path through training and education and has worked to establish education programs to advance and benefit employees in the construction industry.
Loughmiller has worked with the STEM Institute summer camp, a collaboration between K-State and USD 383, since 2014. From 2014-2019, she co-taught a session, "City of Minecraft," which exposed students to different aspects of the building industry through the creation of buildings within the video game, Minecraft. Beyond just playing the game, the sessions included job site tours and hands-on activities.
In 2022, Loughmiller created a new session with a focus on getting more girls interested in the building industry. This new session, "Tiny Houses — Big Learning," used the design and construction of a tiny house as the framework for teaching the campers about buildings. In the session, campers designed and budgeted for the construction of their personal tiny house and built a scale model. The session also included hands-on activities where the students learned how to use various power tools necessary for the construction of a real tiny house.
During her time as a member of the National Association of Women in Construction, she has focused primarily on the group's education foundation. She is also active in the Associated Schools of Construction and currently serves as the Region 4 director. In this role, she is responsible for coordinating the Region 4 student competition. This event brings more than 150 students from the Midwest together to compete in five different construction-related competitions.