SHEN MILSOM WILKE



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Technical Training Center, ExxonMobil Upstream Research Company, Houston
Completion: May 2004
Size: 98,000 square feet

Architect: Page Southerland Page, Houston
Multimedia, acoustics: Shen Milsom & Wilke, Houston

Photo by Randy Hogue

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Exxon Mobil, the world's largest international oil company, needed a central facility employing the latest in classroom technology to train geoscientists, engineers, and other specialists in upstream technologies for oil and gas exploration, development, production and gas marketing.

Shen Milson & Wilke, working with Page Southerland Page, created classrooms, conference areas, a visualization center, and support spaces to accommodate approximately 5,000 students per year who are studying everything from safety to geological formations to computer use. More than 500 instructors teach during the year, with most courses lasting about a week.

Each of the ten classrooms is equipped with bright, high-resolution projectors and high-contrast screens; a sound system that includes microphones, speakers, and amplifiers to boost audio quality; a digital document camera, DVD, VCR, satellite feed, computers and a range of presentation system equipment--all controlled from an instructor's desk.

This instructor's control desk includes easy-to-use touch-screen controls for all audiovisual equipment and multiple computer monitors. The controls are identical in all of the classrooms so that educators don't have to adjust their instructional style to different rooms.

A specialized visualization center used to display and interpret seismic and engineering data, often in 3D, is also equipped with projectors and screens, as well as the touch-screen control system. Six conference rooms used for meetings and information exchange are equipped with projectors and screens.

Perhaps the heart of the center is the audiovisual operations center, which provides central control for the technology in the classrooms, conference rooms, and nine plasma screen displays located around the facility that display classroom schedules as well as technical information. From this space, video and audio signals can be sent to and between classrooms or monitored for help-desk assistance.

The center also includes a system for professionally recording classes on DVD, VHS or hard disk. Background music is distributed throughout the lobby, mezzanine, and classrooms via ceiling-mounted speakers.