We are pleased to announce the upcoming Thought Leadership in Higher Education Facilities Management event. This event, which will take place at Western Michigan University and the Armstrong Global Learning Center, will be held from December 3-5, 2018. It is a peer-to-peer event focusing on improving your return on investment (ROI) from your campus' thermal utilities. The free, exclusive event is designed to help educate managers of facilities, utilities, energy, and maintenance.

Who is Hosting the Event?

The Thought Leadership in Higher Education Facilities Management event is hosted by Armstrong International, which is a company that is committed to helping professionals in facilities management grow and develop. It believes that "knowledge not shared is energy wasted." Because of this, the company has a branch dedicated to education, which it calls Armstrong University, and a new Global Learning Center based in Three Rivers, Michigan. It also holds events at Western Michigan University, which is where day two of the upcoming conference will be held.

What are the Main Topics?

Several important topics are scheduled to be discussed at the event. These include:

How to deal with reductions in budgets and the accompanying reductions in staff, knowledge, and maintenance. This section will give information on recruiting better staff, communicating with financial and administrative officers about critical needs, and implementing training programs so that you can work with employees who come onboard with less prior experience.

Energy reduction initiatives and sustainability. Here, the University of Nebraska's facilities chiefs will discuss the results of their organization's 15 years of energy reduction initiatives, and how these initiatives have lowered their energy consumption by 15% despite enlarging their facilities.

Aged infrastructure and building expansions. Notre Dame's assistant director of utilities engineering will discuss the university's $1 billion expansion and how its legacy infrastructure was improved to handle the new loads. Efforts were focused on its steam system and managing its many steam traps to reduce costs by 21% over just two years.

Using technology to manage large-scale facilities. Here, Western Michigan University's collaboration with Armstrong International is in the spotlight. This partnership has saved the university tens of millions of dollars while reducing its carbon footprint.

These are just the headliners of this multi-day event. Be sure to check out the full agenda (PDF) to learn more about what the event will entail.

Attending this event will give facilities management professionals a variety of insights into ways to make their infrastructure more efficient, cut costs, deal with the follow-on effects of budgetary constraints, and improve their facilities' environmental footprints. It will also provide a great opportunity to network with other facilities managers and learn about the challenges and solutions they have found. The dinners provided by Armstrong International are excellent for networking and create a relaxed environment for non-structured interaction. A block of rooms has also been reserved at the Delta Hotel for those coming from outside the area.

To gain access to this free event, reserve your spot today. You're sure to gain some new insights that you can use at the facility you manage.