I aggreed with Garry Stevens until he offered us his personal criteria
which, I must disagree with if I am going to understand my position in
the profession as one capable of sucess. I can assure you that I am not
an unusual case as a number of my friends have very similar backgrounds.
I am not denying that a cultural background or the ability to play the
violin or piano are positive attributes.
Some of us in the profession spent our early days doing mediocre work ini
grammar and high school, prefering to spend time under cars, learning
trades, fascinated with the means that make things go. I, as well as two
of my high school friends who are now architects, was counselled to find
a trade in my youth and the only way that we got the chance to enter
architecture school was because of a very unususal open enrollment
program at the University of Texas at Arlington. If you can get into the
University's general studies you can study architecture. The hurdles are
set up not at the point of admission but at each semester end. Grading
is strict and the attrition rate is about 75% through four years.
When I was 18 I had never been in a museum of fine art. Similar
stories go for a number of my friends.
I just completed a master's degree from Columbia last week.
I also was awarded a travelling fellowship for research in France.
Again I'm not discouting these criteria laid out but I would like to
suggest that there are other templates that can be constructed for
admission into Architecture Schools.
Out of the undergrad program at UTA have come a number of young people
who have gone on to both higher academics and being principals in firms.
I know there are other schools in the US with similar policies, I'm not
sure if there are sucesses like UTA though.
Design and Architecture skills develop at a much more deliberate pace
than other professional attributes and I don't think the general academic
system fosters them very well nor does it understand them when it sees
them so there is little nutring or testing of them.
i am very much in favor of developing an open system that tests and
challenges the student so that those with a percieved set of attributes
continue and those with skills other than those acknowledged as necessary
are sent into other, possibly more fruitful studies. The competition
inherent in this type of system is more mimetic of the profession.
I understand that it can be attacked for the arbitrariness of the
criteria for advancement but the criteria of the current system is
equally arbitrary and contains little of the tempering that the constant
review and reductions of the open system. I feel that those who want it
most and will work to hone the skills necessary for good design and
architecture and will rise to the challenge.
I could continue further but I think you get my point and have many
contentions.
Thanks for your time.
Brian.
which, I must disagree with if I am going to understand my position in
the profession as one capable of sucess. I can assure you that I am not
an unusual case as a number of my friends have very similar backgrounds.
I am not denying that a cultural background or the ability to play the
violin or piano are positive attributes.
Some of us in the profession spent our early days doing mediocre work ini
grammar and high school, prefering to spend time under cars, learning
trades, fascinated with the means that make things go. I, as well as two
of my high school friends who are now architects, was counselled to find
a trade in my youth and the only way that we got the chance to enter
architecture school was because of a very unususal open enrollment
program at the University of Texas at Arlington. If you can get into the
University's general studies you can study architecture. The hurdles are
set up not at the point of admission but at each semester end. Grading
is strict and the attrition rate is about 75% through four years.
When I was 18 I had never been in a museum of fine art. Similar
stories go for a number of my friends.
I just completed a master's degree from Columbia last week.
I also was awarded a travelling fellowship for research in France.
Again I'm not discouting these criteria laid out but I would like to
suggest that there are other templates that can be constructed for
admission into Architecture Schools.
Out of the undergrad program at UTA have come a number of young people
who have gone on to both higher academics and being principals in firms.
I know there are other schools in the US with similar policies, I'm not
sure if there are sucesses like UTA though.
Design and Architecture skills develop at a much more deliberate pace
than other professional attributes and I don't think the general academic
system fosters them very well nor does it understand them when it sees
them so there is little nutring or testing of them.
i am very much in favor of developing an open system that tests and
challenges the student so that those with a percieved set of attributes
continue and those with skills other than those acknowledged as necessary
are sent into other, possibly more fruitful studies. The competition
inherent in this type of system is more mimetic of the profession.
I understand that it can be attacked for the arbitrariness of the
criteria for advancement but the criteria of the current system is
equally arbitrary and contains little of the tempering that the constant
review and reductions of the open system. I feel that those who want it
most and will work to hone the skills necessary for good design and
architecture and will rise to the challenge.
I could continue further but I think you get my point and have many
contentions.
Thanks for your time.
Brian.