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Architecture School: The Latest Architecture and News

The Best Architecture Schools in the U.S. 2019

The results of DesignIntelligence's annual ranking of architecture schools in the USA are now being determined with a change in the survey question previously used to determine rankings. This year, instead of being asked "Which programs in the United States are best preparing students for a future in the profession?", architecture and interior design professionals responded to two new questions: "What schools do you most admire for a combination of faculty, programs, culture, and student preparation for the profession?" and "From which schools have you hired the greatest number of (undergraduate or graduate) students in the last five years?". 

Call for Applicants: School of Architecture at Academy of Art University in San Francisco

CALL for APPLICANTS

The School of Architecture at Academy of Art University in San Francisco is looking for talented students and we are still accepting applicants for Summer and Fall 2018 admission. You should apply now to be considered for our programs. Financial aid may still be available to those who qualify.

The School of Architecture is currently accepting applications in all programs. Our fairly priced tuition is extremely competitive compared to most US private universities, we also have a democratic, open and fair admissions process, we offer options for online and onsite learning, and instruction by an impressive and reputable faculty

BAM Ranks the 20 Best Master of Architecture Programs in the World in 2018

Spain-based platform Best Architecture Masters (BAM) has revealed its inaugural ranking of the best postgraduate architecture programs in the world. Based on the QS Ranking by Subjects – Architecture / Built Environment, the rankings were selected by 13 educational-performance indicators, including quality and internationality of faculty, alumni, and postgraduate program.

Harvard's Master in Architecture II has topped the BAM ranking, followed respectively by TU Delft's Berlage Post-master in Architecture and Urban Design, and MIT's Master of Science in Architecture and Urbanism. By region, Tsinghua University's Masters in Architecture was ranked first in Asia (#5); Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile's Magíster en Arquitectura in Latin America (#11), and Sydney University's Master of Architecture in Oceania ranks 17th worldwide.

The best master's degrees in architecture are:

4 Steps That Will Help Set You Up for Success in Architecture School

The beginning of the fall semester is quickly approaching, and prospective architecture students are gearing up for the beginning of their future careers. While the next step may seem daunting, the first year of your architecture education helps set the pace for the remaining four to five years. So it's important to get started on the right foot.

Architecture studios are notorious for long nights, intensive model-making and desks overflowing with trace paper and parti diagrams. But there is one important aspect of studio life that is too often neglected: the student-professor relationship.

Read on for the four steps to start investing in this unique relationship to set yourself up for success.

AJ Student Survey Results Pose a Worrying Question: Is Architecture Becoming an Elitist Subject?

The Architects' Journal’s 2018 student survey has revealed troublesome, though perhaps not surprising, trends within the profession. The results of the survey, drawn from nearly 500 students in the UK, suggest that the economically fortunate are more likely to succeed within a culture that promotes unsociable and unhealthy working hours.

The numbers paint a bleak picture of the architecture student lifestyle in the UK, where, including tuition fees, students are now forking out an average of £24,000 per year. 44% of respondents identified this as the largest problem for them and their peers.

So as the traditional route into the profession becomes “increasingly out of reach for many,” is it time for schools and offices to reevaluate their methods in order to maintain a diverse, accessible architecture?

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J. Meejin Yoon to Serve as First Female Dean in Cornell AAP's 122 Year History

Cornell University has named J. Meejin Yoon as the next dean for the School for Art, Architecture and Planning. Yoon, co-founder of Boston-based practice Höweler + Yoon, is the first woman to be named dean in the school’s 122-year history. She moves to Cornell after serving as dean for the architecture School at MIT, where she has been on faculty since 2001.

What's the Difference Between a B.Arch and M.Arch Degree?

The process of becoming an architect can be as confusing as it is extensive. In this article, we'll demystify a crucial component of the path to a career in architecture: what degree you should get. Specifically, we’ll lay out the difference between two common, somewhat comparable degrees: the B.Arch and the M.Arch.

The Best Universities in Latin America That Have Architecture Programs

Times Higher Education (THE) revealed its ranking of the best universities in Latin America and the Caribean. The list is based on the same 13 indicators used in their global ranking, but with modifications that "better reflect the characteristics of Latin American universities," explains the organization. 

The 2018 edition of this regional ranking includes 129 universities from 10 countries rated in the following categories: teaching, research, citations, international outlook, industry income. It should be noted that this measurement is global at the university level and does not measure each academic concentration separately, as QS does in its annual ranking.

Dominated by universities in Brazil, we present the 10 best Latin American universities for architecture, according to Times Higher Education (THE).

5 Ways to Prepare for Architecture School Over the Summer

This summer a brand new class of eager architectural hopefuls are preparing to start their lives in design at architecture schools around the world. Entering a studio environment for the first time brings an exciting set of new creative challenges, but this thrilling new world of architecture can often be tough to anticipate for those who have yet to begin their journey — leaving newcomers feeling unprepared and nervous on their first day.

15 Inspiring Architecture School Buildings from Around the World

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© Matthew Carbone

Architecture schools and the students they house have a particularly unique and interesting building-user relationship. Architecture students value the buildings of their school not only for providing the valuable work space necessary for constructing studio projects but also as an example and model of a building in use. As the buildings are the places where students first learn how to read and understand architecture, design schools become full-scale teaching tools that help new designers grasp structure, details, how materials perform and interact, and so many of the other core concepts of architecture. While the scrutiny of students and faculty can be exhaustive, architects have embraced the challenge of creating engaging works of architecture that both suit the specific needs of a school and take on the pedagogical challenge of educating students by example.

The Top 200 Universities in the World for Architecture 2018

Global higher education analysis firm Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) has revealed its rankings of the world’s top universities for the study of Architecture / Built Environment for 2018. The eight edition of the survey compared 2,122 institutions across the globe offering courses in architecture or the built environment, narrowing down the list based on criteria including academic and employer reputation.

For the fourth straight year, MIT has topped the rankings, once again coming out ahead of the Bartlett School of Architecture and the Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) in 2nd and 3rd respectively. Read on for the full rankings.

DesignIntelligence Announces Top Architecture Schools for 2017–2018

Which programs in the United States are best preparing students for a future in the profession? DesignIntelligence emailed architecture and interior design professionals from around the US and asked them to answer this question, using their answers to rank schools from the perspective of those with the power to hire graduates. According to the report, DesignIntelligence surveyed "a total of 2,654 hiring professionals from 1,923 professional practice organizations" in the fields of architecture, landscape architecture, and interior design.

How to Choose an Undergraduate Architecture Thesis Topic

As architecture students head to their final year of BArch, half-crazy from years’ worth of scraped fingers, ghastly juries, sleepless nights, and a general lack of social life, they encounter the mighty problem of choosing a thesis topic. There are many subjects to choose from, but a personal interest in a particular subject is just one of the many factors that should influence this decision. Students need to ask themselves several other questions: Is the topic significant enough? Is it expansive enough? Is the project realistically doable?

The process can be daunting, for the decision has many consequences; sometimes, the choice of topic alone can mean the difference between the success and failure of a thesis. With so many factors to consider and deadlines closing in, students easily end up making decisions that they regret later. Here are eight tips to help you make an informed choice on the matter:

9 Types of Design Juror Every Architecture Student Faces in School

Design juries undoubtedly form the very foundation of architecture school. Their success or failure, however, largely lies in the hands of the jurors who are assigned to review student work. While architecture is an inter-disciplinary subject with wide-ranging consequences, most jurors are specialists in a singular sub-field. This makes design juries a terrifyingly unpredictable affair; students don’t just battle against their nerves and sleep-deprivation, but are also required to be on their toes to ensure that they can handle anything that the jurors might throw at them.

However, this is easier said than done. As a student, defending your work against criticism from an easily-offended know-it-all juror will probably do you more harm than good. Similarly, it’s hard to impress a building services expert by harping on about the probable positive sociological impacts of your design proposal. Being able to correctly identify the academic or emotive leanings of a juror can go a long way in helping students present their work strategically, thus ensuring that they make the most of their jury experience. Here’s a compilation of nine types of design jurors every architecture student will probably face at some point in school:

LineCAD Offers Solid Collection of Free Architecture CAD Blocks (No Strings Attached)

The people have spoken and the message is clear: “We want CAD blocks, reference drawings in DWG format and templates of all kinds!” Well, feast your eyes on this latest discovery, www.linecad.com. The site is a catch-all for downloadable DWGs and blocks whose scope even goes beyond architecture. (Shout out to your engineer buddies looking for pumps, pipes and gauges!)

84.75 Studio Hours: A Week in the Life of a Master of Architecture Student

This article by Kurt Nelson originally appeared on Medium.

After reading through ArchDaily’s article on the hours architecture students work outside of class, I was curious. I made it through a Bachelor of Science in Architecture degree and I’m currently enrolled in the Master of Architecture program at the University of Pennsylvania, so how does the time I spend on coursework stack up to the average of 22.2 hours per week? Granted, the data they presented only represented first-year students, but it could still be an interesting comparison. With that in mind I set out to log one week of my time, just like you would at a job. Here’s what I found.

New Survey Confirms Architecture as Most Time Consuming Major

Architecture students have long groaned (or bragged) about the long hours and all-night work sessions demanded by their chosen major. Surely, we’ve all thought, no other major must be working this hard – right?

Now, thanks to the results of Indiana University's National 2016 Study of Student Engagement (NSSE), those assertions have been backed up with some numbers: architecture students were found to work an average of 22.2 hours per week, more than 2.5 hours more than any other major.

The Design Progress Through the Years

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Courtesy of Leewardists

At its best, architecture can be a dream come true: the physical manifestation of the creative architect's most exquisite design fantasies. Nowhere is this kind of creative liberty more pervasive than in architecture school—with few practical concerns for cost, policy, or even structural integrity, architecture students are free to execute the purest and most complex proposals their imaginations will allow. And indeed, as their representation and spatial skills progress, students gain the ability to realize more advanced interventions over time. In the real world, though...not so much.