Zaha Hadid Architects and Architects 61 unveiled the design for the new Science Center in the Jurong Lake District, Singapore. The 52,460 square meters complex aims to make science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) more accessible through specialized amenities, educational programs, and interactive experiences. The building is expected to open in 2027, which also marks the 50th anniversary of the Science Center and aligns with the Singapore Green Plan 2030.
Perkins+Will has released details of their design for the Ransom Everglades School in Miami, Florida. The school’s new STEM building will feature flexible classrooms with mobile walls and furniture, and an emphasis on indoor/outdoor connectivity. The school’s role as a nationally-renowned center for science and technology will also be aided by tech-enabled educational tools, fabrication and maker labs, a rooftop outdoor lab, and an entire roof of solar PVs.
The United States Congress has passed a bill which will lead to architecture being officially recognized as a STEM subject. The Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education (CTE) Act was lobbied by the AIA in an effort to “encourage a more diverse workforce, fulfill the promise of design as the synthesis of art and science, and affect a fundamental change in educational curricula.”
The bi-partisan act will allow states to use federal money to modernize the Career and Technical Education curriculum, allowing for an increase in funds available for architectural education at a high-school level. The recognition of architecture as a STEM subject embodies the profession’s history of ingenuity and problem solving, and its operating spheres at the intersection of art and science.
In a recent article for the Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce, Barney Mansavage champions the idea of transforming STEM into STEAM (Science, Technology, ART, and Mathematics). He argues that overlapping science and art helps launch cross-disciplinary conversations and relationships, and in turn, promote experimentation; he thus suggests that educational spaces be designed to bring these fields together. Check out the article here, and more about the TED talk that inspired it, here.
