“Affecting Change in Architectural Education”

Guest Editors:
Leonard Bachman, The University of Houston
Christine Bachman, The University of Houston Downtown

This journal issue examines how change is affected in architectural education, the history of those changes, and the issues which presently dominate the evolution of architectural education. Given the NAAB Re-accreditation Conference and the Oxford Brooks “Teaching In Architecture” Conference events of 2008, there is a sense that momentous change is about to occur in this domain, and such change should be founded on objective investigations that are supported by blind peer review. ARCC Journal is an ideal forum for that foundation.

We solicit research or evidence based articles related, but not limited to the following major themes:
1. Positive and negative impact of institutionally internal studies that examined architectural education, such as the Boyer Mitgang/Carnegie Report, and the AIAS Studio Culture Summits as well as the ARChaos Summits in the UK
2. The consequential impacts of published works on architectural pedagogy which were not commissioned by the collateral organizations
3. New work that critically examines any aspect of architectural education and that suggests how improvements could and should be affected, provided that the critique is based on objective evidence. Such works should not be purely argumentative or speculative
4. The operational impact of particular exterior forces on the conduct of architectural education, such as evolutionary issues of gender, technology, pedagogy, sustainability, and the culture of higher education
5. Resistance to change in architectural education such as entrenchment in atelier formats of teaching, Beaux Arts tradition, or other obstacles
6. Administrative issues such as those arising from university programs on institutional effectiveness, accreditation, accountability, faculty culture, tenure and promotion, or similar influences

There is a two step process for accepting paper proposals. 1) Initial proposal includes a cover page, 300 word abstract, outline of content, keywords and key references, images (optional). Submission: cover with name and contact information + maximum 3 pages, with no identifying content. All paper proposals are subject to a blind peer review process by an editorial board drawn from member schools and named by the ARCC Journal review editorial review board. (Due December 1, 2008: send to arccjrnl@temple.edu)  2) Full papers are reviewed by ARCC review committee. Papers are expected to be roughly 5,000 words. Instructions for paper submission will be sent with letters of acceptance. (Draft paper due March 1, 2009, final paper due April 15, 2009)

Schedule
December 1, 2008- Abstracts due
December 15, 2008- Acceptance of abstracts notification
March 1, 2009- Draft papers due 
March 21, 2009- Comments returned to authors
April 15, 2009- Final copy due

Guest Editors: Leonard Bachman is an associate professor of architecture at the Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture at the University of Houston, where he teaches environmental systems, systems integration and research methods. Christine Bachman is an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Houston Downtown, where she focuses on education, motivation, and persistence. Together, the guest editors’ have co-authored empirical studies on academic workload (JAPR Winter 2006) and on the role of grade inflation in studio education (Oxford Brooks TIA Conference 2008). Leonard was also one of fifty invited participants to the Second Studio Culture Summit and has published other works in this general topic.

For further information contact:
Kate Wingert-Playdon, Managing Editor, ARCC Journal: mwingert@temple.edu
Leonard Bachman, Guest Editor: lbachman@uh.edu
Christine Bachman, Guest Editor: bachmanc@uhd.edu