The 8th Annual Student Organization Alec Building Contest was held in Spring 2009. The event, held in conjunction with Alec's Birthday on April 1st and sponsored by the Friends of Alec Annual Giving Program, had 11 entries. The purpose of this event is to celebrate the tradition and creativity of Alec throughout the engineering community and to increase awareness about Alec and the Friends of Alec program.
Congratulations to all of the contestants in this year's Student Organization Alec Building Contest! 1,676 students, faculty, staff and alumni placed their votes online to choose the winners, and over 1,700 members of the UT community stopped by the ECJ lobby on Wednesday, April 1st to meet Alec and share his many birthday cakes.
And the winner is...
Eta Kappa Nu (HKN) with 28% of the votes
 Alec and the HKN representatives. |
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2nd Place American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) (23% of votes) |
3rd Place Theta Tau (12% of votes) |
Honorable Mention Society of Women Engineers (SWE) (9% of votes) |
Who is Alec and why do we celebrate his birthday?
Alec, the patron saint of the College of Engineering was born of an undergraduate prank.
On April Fool's eve, 1908, a group of mischief-seeking sophomores "borrowed" a small wooden statue from a local tavern. The statue - a jovial beer-quaffing Dutchman - was carted off to campus, where student leaders dubbed him Alexander Frederick Claire, patron saint of UT Engineers. Over nearly 100 years, Alec has had his share of adventures; he's suffered kidnappings, amputations, even an arrest, followed by a pardon from Texas Governor James Ferguson. He's been repaired, de-commissioned, revived, replicated. And he has endured.
Those early youthful pranksters eventually graduated to distinguished engineering careers. Alec remained at the School, where he resides today, a timeless, lighthearted symbol of innovation and perseverance. In order to celebrate the tradition and creativity of Alec throughout the engineering community and to increase awareness about Alec and the Friends of Alec program, the annual Alec Building Contest was created in 2002.
Alec continues to "reappear" at engineering functions and was so inspiring that the Engineering Annual Giving Program was named after him (Friends of Alec). The School continues to celebrate Alec every year on April 1st by throwing him a birthday party, where the winner of the Alec Building Contest is announced.