Abstract:

This project proposes the design of a First Nation school in Albuquerque, envisioning education as a pathway to sovereignty through reciprocity, a core Indigenous value rooted in mutual care between people and the natural world. It re-imagines the school as a living system for healing, empowerment, and cultural resurgence. We explored five modes of reciprocal engagement; Honoring, Sensing, Learning, Sharing, and Returning, that shaped both the tangible and intangible aspects of the project: the architectural tectonics, and the negotiations with place and community. The school is enlivened by transforming the school corridor into an ecotone, a threshold for knowledge exchange with the environment. The corridor bends, shifts, and opens to invite interaction with light, water, earth, flora, and fauna, creating an experience that is lived and continually renewed. This studio embraced drawing as a way of thinking, relating, and questioning (Drawing as research + Research as ceremony ). We approached the process as a ritual of responsibility. This relational method hopes to make the process more accessible, enabling community participation, dialogue, and collective authorship through a shared visual language