Annual 'PolyHouse' Set: Cal Poly Class Tackles Home Makeover for Disabled Community Member

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	May 09, 2008 Annual 'PolyHouse' Set: Cal Poly Class Tackles Home Makeover for Disabled Community Member Cal Poly Professor Roya Javadpour and her project management class are planning their fifth home renovation service project, this time for a Nipomo man confined to a wheelchair. Javadpour's students have raised more than $50,000 dollars in donations of cash, building materials and other assistance for repairs and improvements for the home of the man, who has minimal use of his hands and legs, is unable to move, feed himself or handle any personal needs without assistance. His wife is his primary caregiver. In the fifth annual "PolyHouse" project, the students will work on the Nipomo home on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, May 9, 10 and 11, and Thursday, Friday and Saturday, May 15, 16 and 17. The unveiling is scheduled on May 17. The project goals are to improve the accessibility, safety and comfort of the man’s home by completely renovating and remodeling the entire house. "The project opens students' eyes to social need and community service," Javadpour said. Each year Javadpour and her students work with social service agencies to find potential Poly House project clients. "There are a lot of families who have a need for help, but we also have to find someone with a home that offers a complex set of issues for the students to tackle in a renovation," she said. The educational purpose of the class is to give students hands-on experience planning and managing a technical project involving fundraising, scheduling, supply management, team recruitment, resource allocation, time and cost budgeting, risk assessment, task coordination, project monitoring, and post-project assessment, Javadpour explained. Javadpour's project management students come from a variety of backgrounds, including business, engineering management, and industrial and manufacturing engineering. Central Coast businesses and construction companies gave the Poly House project tremendous support this year, the professor said. A complete list of supporters will be available on the class Web site at: www.polyhouse.org.	Himanshu Parmar Electrical Engineering senior “I like to get my hands dirty. Well, at least as dirty as electrical engineering projects allow.” I've been able to focus on my two areas of interest -- digital design and signal processing -- while working on some very interesting projects.