Amy Berg is vice president-business development for S.M. Wilson & Company, which has offices in St. Louis, Missouri, and Lenexa, Kansas.

The demand for new, expanded and upgraded educational facilities remains steady in Illinois and across the country, as many public school districts experience an increase in students to be served.

This demand for construction services is driving more competition and innovation in how those projects are planned and implemented. More and more school districts are learning valuable economic lessons by embracing the "construction management" approach to their projects.

Traditionally, all school construction activity was handled on a design-bid-build basis. In this scenario, the district first selected an architect, who then designed the project. Then the school district would solicit firm bids from general contractors, select and contract directly with the lowest bidder, and then have the project constructed.

This approach was required by law in most states for public school construction projects, because it was deemed the best and fairest use of taxpayer dollars. However, this approach also carried unforeseen risks in terms of selecting the most qualified contractors and in getting projects completed in time and on budget. So many states, including Illinois, have changed their statutes to allow more innovative ways for schools to plan, design and contract construction projects.

With construction management (CM), a public school district selects a team of architects, engineers and a construction management firm. From the very beginning, the team works together to assess what types of facilities are needed, to determine the design and budget and then begin the construction process.

For public school districts, the law now allows a district to choose a construction manager agent (CMA), just like they would an architect or engineer, as a professional service. The selection of a CMA is made by their qualifications, proposed project team and related school construction experience. The CMA provides the district with pre-construction and construction services, and many can also offer pre-referendum services to help the district provide accurate information to the community prior to a bond issue vote.

The CMA works as a team member with the school district, an architect and an engineer during the programming and design phases of the district's building project. The role of the CMA during this pre-construction phase is to provide accurate and detailed construction cost estimating and construction expertise to the team throughout the design process to make sure the district's budget is maintained and that what is being designed can be efficiently built in the field.

Once the design is complete and the project meets the district's budget, the CMA publicly solicits bids from local subcontractors and suppliers for the various divisions of work. The subcontractors and suppliers selected contract directly with the school district for their portion of the work. During the construction phase, the CMA manages the selected subcontractors and suppliers with professional office and field staff members who act on behalf of the district. The CMA may not self-perform any of the work that becomes a permanent part of the building.

The result of this CMA delivery method is that the public school district gets the benefit of construction expertise during the design process, the pricing benefits from competitive bidding by all subcontractors, and professional project and field management personnel to oversee the construction effort, acting as an extension of the district's own facilities staff.

This approach allows the district to capitalize on the combined experience of the CMA and its planning team to ensure that the best pricing, planning and design strategies, construction materials and high quality subcontractors all come together in a timely, well-coordinated manner. The result is a construction project that can start sooner, proceed faster, avoid unforeseen problems and be delivered as a high quality product that is on time and within budget.

Another advantage of construction management is that many public school districts have facilities managers and departments that are stretched thin on staff and resources. In a design-bid-build scenario, this department is responsible for planning and managing the new construction project. But with the construction management approach, the CMA's staff becomes an extension of the school's facilities staff and an integral part of a team including the architect and engineer that is accountable to the school's leadership.

Saving time, money

When a team of architects, engineers, school planners and a CMA is assembled to work together early in a project, the process usually saves time and money.

In 2004, our firm was selected as construction manager for a highly complex, $57 million building and renovation project for Alton CUSD 11 in Alton, Illinois. Jack Martin, former plant facilities director for the district, says he is a believer in the construction management process.

"Team members looked at the district's plans right at the beginning and generated estimates that provided real data for decision making," Martin said. "The district implemented cost-saving changes to the Alton High School project footprint two or three times as a direct result of value engineering."

The company also helped when the district's masonry budget came up short. Team members met with subcontractors to work out ways to cut expenses.

"In that case, they suggested we use standard brick on the front to match adjacent buildings on the campus and bigger brick on the back and sides to reduce the amount of labor required," Martin said. "They also advised the district to get an early bid package on the structural steel because the company foresaw rapidly rising market prices. That saved Alton about $700,000."

Value engineering allowed the district to add tennis courts and a maintenance storage building, which they initially took out for budget reasons.

"We paid for those out of the savings," Martin said, "and we still have a quality building that will hold up for years."

It was comforting for the board and administration to know they had someone serving as their advocate, said James E. Baiter, former superintendent at Alton. "Through consultation with district administrators and the board's building committee, they guided decisions with the architects, engineers and contractors that were in our best interest."

At the new Columbia Middle School in Columbia, Illinois, more than $1 million was saved by a CMA/ architect team that identified and addressed soil issues on site while the rest of the project was still being designed.

"Without a doubt, the construction management process is the only way to build a school," said William R. Phelps, vice president, Columbia CUSD 4 board of education, because pre-construction services can keep the project on track during the design phase as well as manage the construction.

Leaders in many schools districts still face a learning curve on the benefits of construction management. But with more education, it is clear that the construction management approach will maximize the building of better educational facilities today and in the future.

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