The petition
On the Need for Sustainability Education in the Architecture School:
An Open Letter from Students* to the Architecture Faculty
We are all aware that the built environment shapes human relationship with, and impact on the natural world. We also know that, this relationship is becoming unsustainable. Due in significant part to building design and operations our global environment and climate are changing. Buildings are responsible for 50% of Greenhouse Gas emissions in the US, 40% of material in landfills, and the use of prodigious quantities of water and other natural resources. Many work and living spaces are unhealthy for people, and lack connection to the natural world.
- As a design community, we can do better than this.
- As individuals, we consider ourselves part of the generation that will confront these challenges head on.
- As students of architecture, we see enormous opportunities to contribute to the effort through the informed practice of good design.
- As future professionals we anticipate that our ability to address performance concerns in our work will be critical to the viability of our designs.
- As educators we hope that you will help foster an environment that will prepare us to meet these challenges.
We believe the essence of sustainable design is not simply about minimizing negative impacts. Rather, it is about imagining the best possible future, and a built environment of exceptional and enduring quality. We believe that sustainability considerations can generate good design and introduce creative opportunities rather than limitations. We believe such thinking must be better embedded in Architectural education.
* We are members of a rapidly growing student group focused on furthering sustainable education in the CED. There is ample evidence that an overwhelming majority of the students in Wurster support the spirit of this letter and we’ll be delivering their signatures to prove it.
In light of these considerations, we ask that the Architecture faculty at UC Berkeley join us in signing onto the Sustainable Design Education Goals outlined below. We believe that these actions will enhance the school's commitment to providing the highest quality design education possible to all students:
- Immediate
o Design faculty panel discussion – call a town hall meeting to discuss how sustainable design education fits into plans for the future of the department.
o Begin working with the student body to develop a plan for the implementation of the following proposed changes to build the future of the program together.
- Design Curriculum
o Incorporate criteria of sustainability into the review process in studio projects. Failure to consider sustainability should be viewed as similar to a failure to consider materials, gravity, site context, or program.
o Introduce "Sustainability in the studio" for credit in a manner similar to "structures in the studio" that allows studio students to opt into a more comprehensive focus on sustainable design in their studio work.
o Consistently offer courses in support of the Ecological Design undergrad minor.
o Engage in a serious exploration of the meaning of sustainability in design through new seminar courses that introduce its intellectual history.
- Culture
o Further the conversation in the department by sponsoring a lecture series on sustainable practice in design or by designating sustainability as the theme for the existing series.
- Hiring
o Develop search and hiring criteria that value knowledge of sustainable practice and building performance in the selection of new faculty.
o Conduct a search for at least one new faculty member with experience of and an explicit focus on implementing sustainable design.
o Seek opportunities to bring practicing professionals and faculty from other departments into the CED to address issues of working in this increasingly complex and collaborative world.
- New Offerings
o Introduce a joint March/MS degree in Architecture between Design and Building Science for interested students.
o Offer existing faculty opportunities for exposure to the tools and techniques available for high performance building design and sustainable practice, especially as required to facilitate the above adjustments to curriculum.
- Long Term
o Engage a range of departments across UC Berkeley in an effort to develop courses AND other opportunities for collaboration that cut across the many disciplines that well trained designers will need to draw upon in the future.
o Set up an interdisciplinary center for the study of sustainability in environmental design, with joint faculty appointments between departments. Incorporate hands on, professional, and collaborative design projects, cutting edge performance research, and scholarship on the long view and deep connections implicit in sustainable design.
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