21 April 2006
Scottish architectural giant Keppie Design has condemned a leading architecture school after it scrapped two acclaimed courses.
By Will Hurst
Strathclyde University is closing its part 1 Building Design Engineering and part 2 Integrated Building Design courses, which Keppie director Andrew Pinkerton called a unique model of the type of cross-disciplinary working needed in practice.
Students at Strathclyde also voiced their opposition to closing the courses, which combined architecture, structural engineering and environmental engineering in a form that seemed to mirror the recommendations of the government's Egan Review.
The university's architecture department said it had been forced to close the courses for financial reasons, but remained committed to exposing architecture students to other disciplines.
Pinkerton claimed firms like his were desperate to take on students and graduates with the technical knowledge to accompany their conceptual education.
"The different disciplines need to work together," he said. "Building Design Engineering was one of the best rated courses at Strathclyde... the industry recognised that the students coming out were of a higher calibre than other architectural students.
"It is disappointing that a course that recognises the realities of the industry has not got support from the academics."
Fifth-year student Jonathan McQuillan, who studied both courses, called the closures a "real shame" and demanded a re-think.
He added: "I'm the last of a rare breed and I don't think future students will have the opportunity I had."
But Alan Bridges,course director for the Building Design Engineering course, insisted the decision to scrap the courses had not been taken lightly. He said it had resulted from the university's engineering departments closing their undergraduate courses.
"These are courses we would have liked to continue," he said. "But we could not technically support them. We could not afford to carry the total cost of trying to provide that range of [academic] experience."
Bridges added that the university was now providing an undergraduate course called Architectural Engineering, although the course was not Arb accredited.
Scottish architectural giant Keppie Design has condemned a leading architecture school after it scrapped two acclaimed courses.
By Will Hurst
Strathclyde University is closing its part 1 Building Design Engineering and part 2 Integrated Building Design courses, which Keppie director Andrew Pinkerton called a unique model of the type of cross-disciplinary working needed in practice.
Students at Strathclyde also voiced their opposition to closing the courses, which combined architecture, structural engineering and environmental engineering in a form that seemed to mirror the recommendations of the government's Egan Review.
The university's architecture department said it had been forced to close the courses for financial reasons, but remained committed to exposing architecture students to other disciplines.
Pinkerton claimed firms like his were desperate to take on students and graduates with the technical knowledge to accompany their conceptual education.
"The different disciplines need to work together," he said. "Building Design Engineering was one of the best rated courses at Strathclyde... the industry recognised that the students coming out were of a higher calibre than other architectural students.
"It is disappointing that a course that recognises the realities of the industry has not got support from the academics."
Fifth-year student Jonathan McQuillan, who studied both courses, called the closures a "real shame" and demanded a re-think.
He added: "I'm the last of a rare breed and I don't think future students will have the opportunity I had."
But Alan Bridges,course director for the Building Design Engineering course, insisted the decision to scrap the courses had not been taken lightly. He said it had resulted from the university's engineering departments closing their undergraduate courses.
"These are courses we would have liked to continue," he said. "But we could not technically support them. We could not afford to carry the total cost of trying to provide that range of [academic] experience."
Bridges added that the university was now providing an undergraduate course called Architectural Engineering, although the course was not Arb accredited.
