2019 ACSA Teachers Conference, Practice of Teaching - Teaching of Practice: The Teacher’s Hunch
June 28-29, 2019 | Antwerp, Belgium

Ordering Systems: The Code of Context

Teachers Proceedings

Author(s): Bradford Watson

The Hunch derived from an assessment of the Comprehensive Design Studio, taught at the graduate level in a 4 + 1.5 accredited school of architecture, with the question of how do we define and evaluate “comprehensive”. The definition of comprehensive is 1: covering completely or broadly: INCLUSIVE, 2: having or exhibiting wide mental grasp : COMPREHENSIVENESS, and 2a: the act or action of grasping with the intellect: UNDERSTANDING. This studio includes the learning outcomes defined by the National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB) criteria in Realm C. This realm requires that students “demonstrate that they have the ability to synthesize a wide range of variables into an integrated design solution”. The 2014 Conditions for Accreditation by NAAB define this in a number of ways that all center around the comprehension of complex systems and an architects ability to synthesize a multiplicity of variables “into an integrated architectural solution”. The “synthesizing of variables from diverse and complex systems” requires that architects look beyond the building to its larger implications to society and the environment. The following questions were asked to define a path for evaluation of the curriculum. If weare expecting students to do more than make a technically feasible building and move towards a holistic design that includes a triple bottom line approach to the implementation of the built environment, what skills do they need? What do they need to know to engage and manage the complexities of the world such that they can manifest architectural space? If we are expecting students to evaluate and integrate complex systems, then a systems theory approach to designmust be foundational to their education.

Volume Editors
Richard Blythe & Johan De Walsche

ISBN
978-1-944214-23-4