Discussion Paper

Doctorates in Design in the United States: Status and Analysis

By Richard H. Schneider
President, Architectural Research Centers Consortium, Inc.

Delivered at Delft Technical University's Conference on "Doctorates in Design"
February 10, 1996, Delft, the Netherlands

Presented while the author was a Visiting Research Fellow, University of Manchester, Institute of Science and Technology, PO Box 88, Manchester M60 IQD, United Kingdom

 

ABSTRACT

This paper details the development and status of doctorates in design in the United States, with a particular emphasis on doctorates granted by those programs which also confer professional architecture degrees. Currently there are 18 such programs, although doctorates which focus on architecture and related topics are granted by many more universities that do not have professional degree programs. The paper reports areas of research, student composition, graduation rates, and challenges faced by faculty and administrators. It draws upon the author's experience as a founder and then director of a doctoral program at the University of Florida, as well as upon a recent study completed at Georgia Tech University.

INTRODUCTION

I am pleased and honored to be with you today and to be able to take part in this important meeting. I am here, not only to deliver a presentation on the status of Architectural Doctoral Programs in the United States, but also as a representative of the Architectural Research Centers Consortium, Inc. (ARCC). I am President of ARCC which is a co-sponsor of this meeting. ARCC is a private, international organization of about 45 of the largest and most active architectural research universities, centers, and firms in the United States and Canada. ARCC's primary mission is to facilitate the development of the research culture in architecture schools.

The majority of the 18 universities in the U.S. which have both professional and doctoral programs in architecture are active members of ARCC. And my purpose today is to briefly speak about the status of those programs. The data which supports this talk is derived from my own experience as a founder and then a director of a doctoral program in a large U.S. architecture school, from a nation-wide study of doctoral programs that several of my graduate assistants and I conducted in 1991, and from a national study recently completed by Professor Jean Wineman, at Georgia Tech University.

BACKGROUND AND CONTEXT OF ARCHITECTURAL DOCTORAL STUDIES IN THE U.S.

Doctoral studies in architecture in the United States are a relatively new phenomenon, especially compared with other technical/professional fields, such as engineering or medicine.

I believe that is because architecture and allied professions, such as planning, landscape architecture, construction science, generally have been "intuitive and experiential" type professions, where knowledge has been handed down by great masters/teachers or transmitted by practical field experience to students or practitioners. And that knowledge has been in small, individualized clusters, rather than in large, generalizable "batches." Thus, architecture, at least as it has been taught in U.S. studios, has been more "intuition and experience based" and less "knowledge-based," than in many other professional disciplines.

Architecture simply has not had the same epistomological and pedagogic tradition as have engineering and medicine, or the social and physical sciences. That has had a bearing on the relatively late development, and slow spread (until recently) of U.S. doctoral programs in architecture and related design professions.

According to Moore and Templer (1984) while Harvard and other universities awarded doctoral degrees in architecture since the beginning of the century, the first non-history-focused architectural Ph.D. was awarded by Harvard in 1956. Harvard subsequently disbanded their doctoral program only to reestablish it relatively recently in two forms -- one as a Ph.D. associated with the college of liberal arts, and the other as a "Doctor of Design" (DD) (the only one offered in the U.S.) which provides specializations in architecture, landscape architecture and urban design.

The oldest continually operating doctoral program in the U.S. is found at the University of Pennsylvania, which has specializations in theory, technology, and representation. That program was established in 1964.

Since then (1964) the number of doctoral programs in architecture schools has grown relatively slowly, with a marked jump in growth in the early 1970's (with the energy-crisis in the U.S. and a perceived need at that time for more researchers in building physics/energy) and recently (late 1980's-early 1990's) as architectural research has gained momentum and credibility among college and university-level administrators in the United States.

A Ph.D. in architecture is seen now, by many U.S. architectural college administrators and by some faculty, as a desirable credential to have for a new faculty member. This was not always the case (the reverse was true!).

ARCHITECTURE AND NON-ARCHITECTURE SCHOOLS

The distinction between "architecture" and "non-architecture" schools in the U.S. is important since there are many colleges and universities in the United States which do not have professional programs (either 5-year B ARCH, or 6-year M ARCH programs) but which nevertheless award students Ph.D. degrees for research done which focuses on architecture or design.

Many universities -- 53 by our count in 1991 -- have awarded doctoral degrees for dissertations in architecture (or a very closely allied field), whereas only a minority of these have professional programs in architecture. (CHART 1 -- supporting charts are located in a separate file and may be viewed by clicking on the chart number within the paper text or by accessing at the end of the paper). The so-called "non-architecture" Ph.D. programs may award their students the doctoral degree through a variety of other fields, eg. art, art history, history, liberal arts and sciences, psychology, humanities, or engineering, to name a few.

Our research, and that of Prof. Wineman's at Georgia Tech, has focused primarily on those colleges and universities in the U.S. which award the doctoral degree and also have professional programs in architecture.

What and where are they?

STATUS OF PRESENT ARCHITECTURE DOCTORAL PROGRAMS IN THE U.S.

Presently, we count 18 universities (See CHART 2) in the United States which have professional architecture programs and which also have approved and/or ongoing doctoral programs as well. This is a small percentage (15%) of the 118 architectural programs/schools accredited by the National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB) and recognized by the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA).1 These 18 schools are almost evenly split between public and private institutions but represent, on the whole, established and mature, graduate-research institutions with world class faculty, students, and facilities.

These 18 schools include several not surveyed in the Georgia Tech study, by Dr. Wineman, mentioned earlier. Her data concentrates on 14 schools, which we also identified. However, we also include Harvard University (the Doctorate of Design), Rice University (which has a very individualized course of study for the degree), and Texas Tech University (whose program in Land Use Planning and Management was administered by the Architecture School). In addition, we include Arizona State University whose doctoral program has just been formally approved and which will accept its first students this coming fall.

Our original study omitted Columbia University (which has a very small program -- 4 students -- focused on History, Theory and Criticism), which is now included among the 18.

This number does not, however, include the two Canadian Ph.D. programs, one new program at McGill University (set up by Derrick Drummond) and a long-established program at the University of Montreal.

Also, this number does not count the very many Urban and Regional or City Planning Ph.D., programs across the U.S. (upwards of 50 at least) which may or may not be associated with architecture and design schools. Many planning schools are affiliated with schools of government, politics, political science, or other social sciences (such as at Florida State University, one of my colleague institutions).

Finally, the 18 schools do not include several programs still in the approval process or formative stages. These include programs at the University of Arizona (which is developing a multi-disciplinary, international design-oriented Ph.D., program with 5 schools in Mexico), North Carolina State University (which is working on a doctoral program in design concentrating on visualization and human-technology interaction), at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana (which has been developing a doctoral program for years), and at Colorado State University, (which also has been developing a doctoral program, on and off, for years.)

The fact that some of these programs have been in the development process for quite some time illustrates the costs, the "degree-conservatism" and the many bureaucratic hurdles that most universities, especially state universities, face when trying to establish a new doctoral degree program. This is especially true in those fields where a strong demand from the profession cannot be clearly demonstrated, in the absence of other, pressing problems (eg. in Florida we have hurricanes, growth pressures, energy problems from sun loads, which in the mid-late 1980's helped make the case for a new doctoral degree in design, planning and construction. Other places have not been able to demonstrate, as clearly I believe, these type of crises which help propel state legislators and bureaucrats to approve new research programs).

AREAS OF RESEARCH/WORK CONCENTRATION

CHART 3 shows, according to our data, the general areas of research concentration offered by the 18 schools of architecture for the doctoral degree. Recurrent focal areas (themes) include History, Theory and Criticism, Urban and Regional Planning, Environmental Studies of a variety of types, including technological studies, and Design of a variety of types, including Urban Design.

This general five-fold topology is mirrored in the concentration of doctoral degrees granted by the schools from the period 1974-1988, the time frame during which we analyzed architectural dissertation abstracts (from Dissertations in Architecture, University Microfilms, University of Michigan).

Our findings are summarized in CHART 4. Out of a total of 346 dissertations abstracts reviewed for the above time period we categorized the following distribution of dissertations:

The remaining 10% couldn't be classified under any one area but belonged to several.

When we look at the Ph.D.'s awarded from the "non-architecture" Ph.D. programs in the U.S., we found that, of the 140 analyzed, the great majority (66% or 93) were granted for study in the area of History, followed, in distant second place, by Building Design (accounting for 25% or 35), with Urban Design/Planning, Landscape Architecture, and Construction falling far behind in third, fourth and fifth places.

Since many of the "non-architecture" programs are associated with history programs and the humanities we would expect to find (and do) a significant output of dissertations in this area.

STUDENTS

The Wineman Study offers rich data as to the student composition of U.S. architectural Ph.D.-granting schools as well as to the number of degrees awarded through the years 1990-1994.2 According to that data, based on 1994 enrollment figures, there were a total of 380 doctoral students enrolled at the 14 universities she studied. The largest programs in the U.S. are, in order, University of Pennsylvania (49 students), University of California at Berkeley and the University of Michigan (tied at 46 students each) followed by Texas A&M University (45 students).

Of the 380 total number of students, 62% (236) were males and 38% (144) were females. While males still predominate by a wide margin, the substantial proportion of females speaks to the inroads that have been made by women over the past twenty years into what was once an almost completely male dominated field, at least within professional architectural schools. At the University of Wisconsin and at UCLA women and men are found (at least in 1994) in equal proportions. Only at Cornell University do women actually outnumber men, 2 to one.

The general male-female make-up is almost mirrored in the proportion of non-U.S. citizens to U.S. citizens in the make-up of the national student body of architectural schools Wineman reviewed. Thus, Wineman found that 58% (220) of the students were U.S. citizens, whereas 42% (160) were non-U.S. citizens. In three schools she studied, the University of Michigan, Texas A&M, and the University of Wisconsin, foreign students made up a majority of the total student population.

While non-U.S. citizens are a minority in the other 11 schools, they are a sizeable minority overall, far outdistancing the proportion of non-U.S. citizens in the vast majority of undergraduate programs in the U.S., and at most universities generally. This high proportion of non-U.S. students in architecture is echoed in other disciplines in the U.S. with strong technical components, such as the physical and earth sciences, engineering, and medicine. Many of these students -- in all the disciplines noted above -- come from the Mid-East, Asia, and Latin America, often from "Third World" or developing countries.

This large non-U.S. student enrollment may present problems to existing programs seeking increased funding from conservative ("America-First" state legislators and other officials) and make it more difficult for universities to establish new doctoral degree programs because of the same reason.

This is related to the question as to where students will go following graduation, and following the investment of significant public-resources. To respond that such a person is returning to China, or Jordan, or to Peru does not often sit well in the era of academic, fiscal and world-view retrenchment found in some parts of the U.S. presently.

It should be noted that there are generally negligible percentages of minority students (never more than 12%) -- Black, Hispanic, Asian, and Native American (Indian) students -- found at the institutions that Wineman surveyed. This is a significant ongoing problem in the U.S.

GRADUATES

Finally, any test of an educational program must ask how many graduates are being sent to the academic and professional job markets? As CHART 5 (in modified form) from Wineman's study shows, between 1990 and 1994 190 students were graduated from the 14 institutions she studied (an average of about 38 graduates/year), with the largest number -- 44 -- coming through the University of Michigan's doctoral program (23% of the total number of graduates). Following behind Michigan is Berkeley with 29 students (15% of the total) and Cornell in third place with 19 graduates (10%). A bare majority of graduates (98 or 51 percent) are distributed in varying numbers among the other 11 schools.

In comparison, during the same period of time in the United States there were more than 70,000 doctoral graduates in the engineering disciplines alone, a ratio of 179 to one for the 5-year period. I have not done the research for the social sciences or the humanities, but I suspect the ratios to be nearly as great.

This disparity points to many things which deserve elaboration in subsequent papers. Among these are the comparative state of the art of research in architecture vis a vis other professions/disciplines, the changing market for architectural doctoral degrees in academia and elsewhere (eg. the demand), and the growth of "knowledge-based" studios as part and parcel of the architectural curriculum.

Excellent reference points for those wishing to proceed further in these topics are papers by Jesson (1995) and conference papers edited by Spreckelmeyer (1993).

SOME CONCLUSIONS

Since inception in the 1940's, U.S. doctoral programs in architecture have had a slow, and often lurching growth in terms of the number of programs and the output of graduates. Growth spurts, in the 1970's and the late 1980's have corresponded to both large scale societal pressures (eg. the energy crisis, environmental issues and concerns) as well at to more localized public issues (eg. state-level population growth pressures, and local natural disasters). Another factor contributing to more recent growth is the maturation of some architectural/planning research programs at certain universities, especially in the west and south (eg. Arizona State University and the University of Florida). This research maturity permits these schools to support graduate research assistants for relatively long periods of time, or at least long enough to earn the doctorate.

However, as long as the profession of architecture, joined by a fair proportion of faculty members in architecture departments in the U.S., is generally resistant to the inclusion of research methodology coursework and "knowledge-based studios" into the curriculum and is skeptical of the conduct of research as applied to architecture, doctoral programs in the field will continue to grow slowly -- in fits and starts -- as will the number of graduates.

This growth pattern probably suits the academic market despite the fact that some university vice-presidents, deans, (and sometimes chairs) with institution-wide perspectives, have in recent years begun demanding that entry-level aspirants have the doctoral degree as the "terminal degree." These broad views, have acted to counter-balance the professional antipathy toward research and probably have provided the basis for the employment of the small numbers of doctoral graduates produced each year in the United States.

However, a result of this seesaw between the profession and academia has been a form of schizophrenia that is evident, among other things, in the perennial instability of architecture's national research organization within the leading professional and academic societies. While there are suggestions presently on the table to stabilize this situation, there is not yet a long term solution to the greater problem, which is the role of research within the profession of architecture generally.

SPECIFIC PROBLEMS AND CONCERNS

I will close with an enumeration of what I consider to be some specific and relevant problems and concerns within US doctoral programs. These include:

Funding: While always a primary concern, this may manifest itself in many ways, not the least of which is the problem of the balance of state (public) support vs external grant support. This applies particularly to large-scale public universities. Of course, research funding is often a serious problem within many private universities as well.

Core Curriculum -- what is it?: This is a particular problem within those multi-disciplinary architecture schools where epistemology, politics, and world views may be different among units -- eg. planners, engineers, landscape architects, architects, interior designers. While this should be a benefit -- because of the diversity of approaches -- in practice it is often a headache which must be overcome by administrative ingenuity, sensitivity and perseverance.

Core Curriculum -- who teaches it?: This can be a major problem for the diversity reasons stated above: it can also translate into a never-ending organizational shuffle which is disruptive to students.

Faculty -- where do they come from?: May be a problem where there are few Ph.D. faculty members on staff. But, the more serious problem is dividing up and allocating their time to the doctoral program, especially where Ph.D. programs have been created "on the backs of other programs," that is where they have been carved out of the FTE's of existing departments. This can be a breeding ground for faculty resentment and conflict.

Research Support: This is related to funding, of course, but also is linked to the continual pressure that U.S. faculty are under to capture grant monies to support graduate assistants. Moreover, there are unequal sources of support insomuch as technological and scientific research (eg. building physics) and construction research areas (materials and methods) tend to be well-supported, whereas design (with the exception of some types of urban design), history, representation, and building poetics tend to be difficult to fund. The latter fall under the rubric of "scholarship" rather than research. This can be the source of great resource inequity and, consequently, resentment among the faculty.

Organization and Linkage to Other Units: While this can and does impact single-discipline colleges, it is a particular problem for multi-disciplinary schools, which are common in the organization of U.S. architectural colleges. The question is, "how should the doctoral program be organized?" (eg. as an umbrella program under the Dean's Office or under an office of its own, or within each of the separate disciplines which may participate in it) and "who should administer it and how?" Furthermore, there is the fundamental problem of the Ph.D. program's linkage to individual departments, which may seek to enforce different standards relative to everything from the oral examination to the conduct of the field research. These differences may or may not be mediated by university-wide graduate school rules and practice.

Credit for Dissertation Advisement: In some faculties, especially where there has been limited experience with doctoral study, there has been insufficient credit given to faculty for their time and effort expended in advising doctoral students. This can be and often is a source of significant injustice and resentment among the doctoral faculty.

Minority Representation: Minorities, especially native U.S. minorities, are very under-represented. This can result in the lack of cultural diversity and sensitivity in the schools and fierce competition among the schools for those minority students who are available.

Non-U.S. Representation Among Students: At the same time, the relatively large proportion of non-U.S. students in architectural doctoral programs can be a detriment when seeking to "justify program existence/expansion" among conservative audiences or when seeking to establish a new program. This is so despite the significant benefits of cultural diversity.

Tracking of Graduates: This seems to be an issue throughout academia but is of particular concern to those programs, such as architecture doctoral programs, which have small or relatively uncertain markets. Most U.S. schools do not do a very good job of tracking their graduates to ascertain where they are working and their relative success levels. National data here would greatly assist our understanding of the market for doctoral graduates in architecture and design. (In contrast, it is interesting how good a job Alumni offices do in tracking graduates!)

In sum, I have attempted to present an outline of the status of U.S. doctoral programs in architecture as well as touch on some of the problems and concerns of many such programs. While certainly not an all-inclusive or exhaustive list, I tried to catalog some major challenges that faculty and administrators face every day. I hope it has been useful to this conference and I invite your criticism and comment.

REFERENCES

Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture, Guide to Architecture Schools, Fifth Edition, ACSA, Washington, DC (1994).

Jesson, D., An Expanded View of Architectural Research, Unpublished paper for ARCC, University of Manitoba, (1995).

Moore, G.T. and Templer, J.A., eds., Doctoral Education for Architectural Research, ARCC and the National Science Foundation, Washington DC, (1984).

Schneider, R.H., Johnston, S., Kirk, C., Summary Description of US Architectural Dissertation Topics by Category -- 1974-1988, ARCC and the University of Florida, (1991).

Spreckelmeyer, K., ed., Knowledge Based Architectural Education, ARCC Conference Paper, San Antonio Texas, (1993).

Wineman, J., Comparative Statistics on Georgia Tech and other Ph.D. Programs in Architecture in the United States, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia (1994).

NOTES:

1. See Guide to Architecture Schools, Fifth Edition, Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture, Washington D.C., 1994.

2. Jean Wineman, Comparative Statistics on Georgia Tech and Other Ph.D. Programs in Architecture in the U.S., Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia, March, 1995.

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