NCARB Prize 2011
2011 NCARB Prize for Creative Integration of Practice and Education in the Academy
Six schools were selected for awards for the 2011 NCARB Prize, with the grand prize—a cash award of $25,000—going to the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. Five submissions were selected as NCARB Prize winners and recipients of $7,500 each, and two submissions received honorable mentions. The jury, comprised of members of the Council’s Practice Education Committee and three academic representatives (deans, heads, or chairs) from schools with architecture programs accredited by the National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB), met 25-26 February 2011 in Washington, DC. They considered 45 entries representing 34 different colleges and universities. |
PRIZE WINNERS
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University School of Architecture and Design "Designing Practice" University of Cincinnati School of Architecture and Interior Design "Roche Health Center" University of Oregon School of Architecture and Allied Arts "Sustainable City Year (Salem) – Police Station for the City of Salem" University of Tennessee-Knoxville School of Architecture "A New Norris House" University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Department of Architecture "Campus | Community Initiative" Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University School of Architecture and Design "A Sustainable, Net Zero Energy Dwelling" |
The NCARB statement about the Roche Health Center Project:
Collaborative relationships between students, their instructors, architect practitioners, and many others helped turn scarcity into sufficiency for health care needs in rural Tanzania, East Africa. Together, they created a 14-building master plan for a health center and made arrangements to obtain materials and train local workers for its construction in one of the world’s most medically underserved regions. The project involved graduate students, architects, engineers, two nonprofits, the Tanzanian government, and the university’s colleges of medicine, nursing, and pharmacy. Through the unique collaboration, students participated in cultural research, testing of building materials, contract preparation, marketing, financing, and project and construction management. The jury praised the project for being replicable in many parts of the world needing quality building design and construction.
Collaborative relationships between students, their instructors, architect practitioners, and many others helped turn scarcity into sufficiency for health care needs in rural Tanzania, East Africa. Together, they created a 14-building master plan for a health center and made arrangements to obtain materials and train local workers for its construction in one of the world’s most medically underserved regions. The project involved graduate students, architects, engineers, two nonprofits, the Tanzanian government, and the university’s colleges of medicine, nursing, and pharmacy. Through the unique collaboration, students participated in cultural research, testing of building materials, contract preparation, marketing, financing, and project and construction management. The jury praised the project for being replicable in many parts of the world needing quality building design and construction.
SEED competition
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Guided by Ethics, Framed by Community Values
Making a national metric to evaluate locally based projects is a complex process. The SEED® Network depends on our Mission and Principles (shown below), which were based on a survey of 200 SEED Network members from across the country, to guide the criteria that constitutes the SEED metrics. However, a bottom-up, value-definition process must take place to develop the priority structure for each project based on a community's collective interests. SEED's Mission is to advance the right of every person to live in a socially, economically and environmentally healthy community. |
SEED Principles
1 — Advocate with those who have a limited voice in public life. 2 — Build structures for inclusion that engage stakeholders and allow communities to make decisions. 3 — Promote social equality through discourse that reflects a range of values and social identities. 4 — Generate ideas that grow from place and build local capacity. 5 — Design to help conserve resources and minimize waste. |
ACSA Collaborative Practice Award 2011-12
To honor the best practices in school-based community outreach programs.
GLOBAL COLLABORATIVE PRACTICES
ABSTRACT
Since 2008, our university has been engaged with a humanitarian design project in East Africa that was initiated by a local non-profit, engaged by our school of Architecture, has spanned across our university, incorporated local and international architecture and engineering firms, and included participants and consultants across the world. The goals of this project are to engage students, faculty, practitioners and communities in a project that addresses global poverty and inspires our institution and our partners to provide effective humanitarian design responses. Our institution fully supported this project as it aligns directly with our university agenda for collaboration and community outreach.
The village where we are working has no infrastructure for power, sanitation or water and a post-colonial construction technique that is unsafe and unsustainable. Since 2008 we have been working with the community and our team of designers, engineers and researchers to develop a model for rural health care that is seismically-resistant yet durable, thermally comfortable and constructible by anyone in the community. Our university has recognized this project as a model for global design that addresses the need for collaboration between academia, practice and community while addressing global humanitarian issues.
The collaborators on this project have included graduate architecture design studios, students and faculty in architecture, design and engineering, participants across the university, and architecture and engineering firms.
The collaborative integration of academia, practice and the non-profit sector are critical for addressing the complexities of Global Humanitarian Design. Our objectives were to provide a replicable prototype for safer, more durable, more comfortable construction that could be built by anyone in the community. The health center opened on April 1, 2011 and has been a success on every level. One villager proclaimed “This building is not only IN our community; it IS part of our community!”.
Juror Comments: This is an exemplary university-led, applied-research and engagement-driven project is rooted in the community – for the community. This balanced effort involved a sustained faculty commitment with practitioners, students, and community leaders and constituents to address the underserved needs of the community. The final outcome of their effort not only solves one of those needs, but also results in a compelling architectural project. The lasting impact of this project is its integrative framework that will continue to serve as model for future collaborations and the direct transfer of knowledge to members of the community.
GLOBAL COLLABORATIVE PRACTICES
ABSTRACT
Since 2008, our university has been engaged with a humanitarian design project in East Africa that was initiated by a local non-profit, engaged by our school of Architecture, has spanned across our university, incorporated local and international architecture and engineering firms, and included participants and consultants across the world. The goals of this project are to engage students, faculty, practitioners and communities in a project that addresses global poverty and inspires our institution and our partners to provide effective humanitarian design responses. Our institution fully supported this project as it aligns directly with our university agenda for collaboration and community outreach.
The village where we are working has no infrastructure for power, sanitation or water and a post-colonial construction technique that is unsafe and unsustainable. Since 2008 we have been working with the community and our team of designers, engineers and researchers to develop a model for rural health care that is seismically-resistant yet durable, thermally comfortable and constructible by anyone in the community. Our university has recognized this project as a model for global design that addresses the need for collaboration between academia, practice and community while addressing global humanitarian issues.
The collaborators on this project have included graduate architecture design studios, students and faculty in architecture, design and engineering, participants across the university, and architecture and engineering firms.
The collaborative integration of academia, practice and the non-profit sector are critical for addressing the complexities of Global Humanitarian Design. Our objectives were to provide a replicable prototype for safer, more durable, more comfortable construction that could be built by anyone in the community. The health center opened on April 1, 2011 and has been a success on every level. One villager proclaimed “This building is not only IN our community; it IS part of our community!”.
Juror Comments: This is an exemplary university-led, applied-research and engagement-driven project is rooted in the community – for the community. This balanced effort involved a sustained faculty commitment with practitioners, students, and community leaders and constituents to address the underserved needs of the community. The final outcome of their effort not only solves one of those needs, but also results in a compelling architectural project. The lasting impact of this project is its integrative framework that will continue to serve as model for future collaborations and the direct transfer of knowledge to members of the community.