New infrastructure education programme announced

The programme’s student and educator entitlements allow no-cost learning licenses for Bentley infrastructure engineering applications and proven learnings through the new Bentley Education portal.

Students and educators from around the globe can register on the Education portal and connect to infrastructure organisations and resources to prepare for and to recruit for infrastructure engineering careers. Bentley also announced the Future Infrastructure Star Challenge 2021.

The Bentley Education portal provides a single source for an on-demand, frictionless, and fun experience for students as they build and enhance their digital design skills. Students and educators have access to comprehensive resources, including:

• Insights from leading AEC professionals, sharing what the industry has to offer students and what skills are in high demand;
• The latest news and emerging trends in architecture, engineering, and construction; and
• Firsthand perspective of current engineering students, mentors, and women in infrastructure engineering.

The programme offers full access to learning licenses of over 40 of Bentley’s most popular applications used by infrastructure professionals around the globe, including ContextCapture, MicroStation, OpenRoads Designer, STAAD.Pro, and SYNCHRO. The portal can be accessed here.

The Bentley Education programme is open to students and educators at community colleges, technical institutes, polytechnics, universities, secondary schools, and homeschooled students. The programme is designed to create talent that can rise to the challenge of improving quality of life and positively changing the world using Bentley infrastructure engineering software, applications, and proven learnings. The Bentley Education programme will also help students develop digital skills, which are critical for a qualified talent pipeline to support infrastructure growth and resilience worldwide.

The Bentley Education program uses a role-based learning approach, allowing future infrastructure professionals to focus on specific capabilities needed for specific professions. Students can go beyond mere product proficiency and develop a comprehensive understanding of skillsets required to excel in various roles in infrastructure engineering.

“With many nations and institutions committing to infrastructure and digital education initiatives as top priorities for a post-pandemic world, we are excited to launch this much-requested and responsive program now,” said Katriona Lord-Levins, Chief Success Officer, Bentley Systems. “We want to inspire and encourage students to learn about infrastructure engineering as a possible career path, and to introduce these young minds to the vast opportunities that lie ahead, with infrastructure going digital.”

The Bentley Education portal also serves as a gateway for individual students or teams of two to submit their innovative concepts for Bentley’s Future Infrastructure Star Challenge 2021. The global competition is open to students from community colleges, polytechnics institutes, and universities. Students advancing in the Challenge, based on their ideas that improve quality of life, will work on modeling, simulation, and visualisation to develop a design model. The winner of the Future Infrastructure Star Challenge will be announced during the Going Digital Awards at the Year in Infrastructure 2021 Conference.

The inaugural Future Infrastructure Star Challenge is divided into Stage 1 (Conceptualisation), and Stage 2 (Design and Visualisation). In Stage 1 (Conceptualisation), students are invited to submit their ideas for 'a next big infrastructure project' in any of the following categories: road and rail, building and facilities, water and wastewater, cities and mapping, and power generation. While conceptualising their idea, students should focus on an environmental challenge that affects or is affected by infrastructure development, consider applying the Internet of Things, and emphasise the project’s contribution to the world’s health and welfare.

The top 20 judged projects from Stage 1 (Conceptualisation) will each win $500, with the top ten projects moving on to Stage 2 (Design and Visualisation). Here, each such entry may take advantage of opportunities to work with infrastructure professionals, and/or to attend masterclasses with Bentley experts, to bring their ideas to life using Bentley applications. In addition to being announced and introduced at the Year in Infrastructure 2021 Conference, the winner of the Future Infrastructure Star Challenge 2010 will receive a cash prize of $5,000 and recognition in Bentley’s 2021 Infrastructure Yearbook.

Vinayak Trivedi, vice president of Bentley Education, said: “We want to make the Bentley Education portal the place where students can go to learn about and become inspired to make infrastructure engineering their career choice. The goal of the programme is to help students who are passionate about infrastructure to get a jump-start on a fulfilling career. The Future Infrastructure Star Challenge 2021 provides an opportunity for them to be creative and innovative in project designs for improving the quality of life and positively changing the world.”