funny. i was thinking about considering their architecture and the moving image programme. i guess not anymore...:(

Comment from BD_ONLINE:

Teaching Should Be Schools’ Priority
19 November 2004, Building Design
by Zoë Blackler


When the news first broke that the Cambridge architecture school was in crisis, it seemed only a matter of time before the rest suffered a similar fate. Now other schools in the prestigious Russell Group are under pressure to improve their research performance, at the expense of their traditional emphasis on studio-teaching.

The universities’ reputations are at stake. Cambridge, UCL, Manchester — all rely on their excellent research reputations to secure government funding and attract lucrative overseas students. Architecture schools are being told by vice-chancellors they must achieve the levels of research obtained by other academic departments if they are to survive.

But this bias towards research risks obscuring the fact that the true purpose of any university is to teach. Students, seduced by the promise of access to the best minds, will be disappointed. The level of research output now demanded by the universities means academics will spend increasing time hammering out papers behind closed doors, leaving less time for students. This tension between research and teaching is particularly poignant in architecture, where the best designers are rarely the best researchers.

The problems now faced by Cambridge and others stem from their disappointing results in the 2001 research assessment exercise, which determined how central government funding would be allocated. As the schools of architecture complain, the RAE failed to acknowledge the unique nature of the discipline or to understand design-based research.

Now, in order to win a reprieve from its university, the Cambridge school is switching its emphasis further towards theoretical research. Its research output has already increased, it says. In the past year, its staff have published 126% more in academic journals, 33% more books and 90% more book chapters. Its latest lectureship has been given to an internationally recognised researcher.

There is already concern at how few teachers are experienced practitioners with a substantial body of built work. As schools elevate the importance of their staff’s research skills over design skills, this situation can only get worse.

It is ironic that research, first introduced by architecture schools in the 1950s to support studio-based teaching, now threatens to undermine it.

Good article, Mason.

Certainly a bigger issue for architectural education than just potential loss of the Cambridge program. The tenure/publication link has always seemed problematic to me, even when I was an undergraduate on a faculty selection committee...now its affecting a whole institution's future instead of just that of one professor. Obviously you want your instructors to be accomplished individuals in their own right, but if it takes away their ability to serve their students' need...?

Press Release on the event from ArcSoc:

Hands off Architecture! (follow up)
Cambridge University Architecture Society
29th November 2004

Today students rallied to defend Architecture at Cambridge. More than 500 gathered at the Senate House. Their protest was directed at the University management's recommendation to close the school of Architecture. This controversial decision cites the Department's downgrading in the recent RAE as reason enough to lock the students out.

Speakers addressed the crowd who were lively and high-spirited despite the bright crisp chill. These included:

Celebrity actor and TV presenter Griff Rhys Jones, an Emmanuel College alumnus (1972), who asked why, in the light of our concern for buildings of the past, we can be so cavalier about the buildings of the future as to close the most highly rated design school in the country. "We're in the shadow of Kings College chapel. On a day like today it is appropriate (for the University's senior ranks to reflect on the fact that) this building is an architectural symbol for the University."

Next was Sunand Prasad who leads London practice Penoyre and Prasad, and also has a hand in key decisions and policies through pivotal positions at CABE and the RIBA. Prasad argued that: "You shouldn't have to make cost arguments in relation to key tools of civilisation."

Cambridge MP Anne Campbell is well placed to understand the vital role that the Department of Architecture's research plays in the life of the town. Campbell is at pains to stress the contribution that students make to the city. She pointed to the popularity of the subject at Cambridge:
"You (the students) are a testament to this fact (that architecture attracts twice as many applicants per place than most other subjects). Students recognise (architecture's) value, and so should the University."

Rowan Moore, Head of the Architecture Foundation, well-known writer and architecture correspondent for the Evening Standard, reflected on how architecture and design have become so central - especially in recent years - to how Britons today see their cities and see themselves. Moore drew on the particular values and qualities that a Cambridge School education implies - a quality he described as its 'cultural breadth'.

Jeremy Till is known as something of a maverick in architectural education, and he and his colleague Sarah Wigglesworth have played a key role in rethinking the dynamics between practice and research. At the same time they have been working to maintain the '5' rating achieved in the 2001 RAE at Sheffield, the school where they are both professors. He placed the Cambridge situation in the wider context of architectural education, arguing that the implications for other Schools are equally serious. In a speech that thrilled the crowd, Till confessed that while he now represents a 'rival' school, the current situation "… is much more important".

Support for the Department that had emerged from every quarter over the past weeks, spilled out onto the streets today. Cambridge's alumni network delivered many protesters. Some London offices allowed their staff time off in order to join the protest. A fund-raising drive has also sprung up.

Alumni initiatives including high-level lobbying and letters of protest from far and wide, matched by grassroots student efforts. A CUSU and ArcSoc petition to be delivered to the General Board in advance of their key meeting on December 8th has gathered thousands of signatures as well as many other academics of high standing from all over the country. Design celebrities, leading industry figures and senior academics have expressed their contempt for the University management's decision.

This controversy comes at a time when architecture and design has never been more popular. At the same time concern for the city and its impact on the environment is acute. As Prasad implies in his speech, no other institution advances the same kind of research as the Cambridge school of architecture into what it takes to make a good city - balancing questions of ethics, sustainability, politics and urbanism. Cambridge's commitment to every quarter of this challenge acknowledges that, preparing for the urban future is a key research obligation today.

The scroope website has updates about the petition, the university will decide whether or not to keep the architecture department on 8th of December 2004.

In the meantime you can complete the survey Mason mentioned above or get in contact with Peter Sparks at pcjs2@cam.ac.uk to find out how you can help the campaign. He is however very busy these days.

righteous fist -
did you go to the protest?

Yeah I went, but only managed to catch the end of the speeching and shouting..ooops. There were a lot of people there though and two television crews hanging around the front, a lot of effort has gone into getting the word out in the university itself - many of the protesters weren't architects, I'll ask for some photographs. The Guardian reports again, although none of us were wearing black.

I'm coming round to the idea that it's more New Labour meddling; funding founded on research, research founded on quantative results - results that are business feedable. the cambridge closure isn't just about the state of architectural education, it's education in general, there is little idea of education as provider of choices, only of education as part of the worker production line, witness the moves to introduce specialisation at the secondary (11-16) school level.

sounds like the classic english debate between Matthew Arnold vs Thomas Henry Huxley. Oh how history repeats itself.

righteous fist -
would you be interested to write an account of the event and any subsequent events surrounding the cambrisge debacle?
archinect needs a person in the fray to patin a picture of what's happening there ... can you be the righteous one?

send me or Paul Petrunia an email on this. Or maybe you know of someone that is at cambridge in the middle of it...

more

A Critical Faculty

Cambridge without architects would be a disaster

Antony Gormley
Wednesday December 1, 2004
The Guardian

The news that Cambridge University is thinking of closing its architecture department is absolutely devastating. From my own experience, architecture students are among the brightest, most thoughtful and widely cultured. The Cambridge faculty has always had double the number of applicants of any other in the country and continues to be a lively place of learning and debate. The prospect of our leading research university closing its only department that has a direct impact on the quality of our built environment is worrying and may indicate deeper attitudes and realities that are of equal concern.
Cambridge has always supported the literary and performing arts. The encouragement of visual awareness, however, has not been so high on the agenda. While three colleges offer artist-in-residence placements and the Visual Arts Society invites artists to speak, there are few opportunities for actually making or painting anything in Cambridge. It seems that the closure of the architecture faculty could be associated with this lack of connection with contemporary visual culture. At a time when British artists are making more of a contribution to the agenda of world art than ever before, this is a wasted opportunity to say the least.

The other and more persistent worry is that the university, in a climate of ever-diminishing resources, is forced to concentrate its efforts on areas of research that are directly useful to industry, which has inevitably led to a diminishment of the wider culture of the university, in which debate and stimulation cross-fertilise sciences and humanities by mutual familiarity.

Architecture is one of the most syncretic of studies. It demands an understanding of history, the pragmatics of structure, a transcultural appreciation of material and the mathematics of form. It could be argued that it is the only area of study that has a direct effect on life and the experience of the urban environment on which so many of us depend. If the point of university education is to contribute to the evolution of a humane world, how can we cut one of the strongest implements in our ability to realise it? The historical context of our major universities can foster the fogey in matters of artistic taste, but through the enlightened patronage of this very university, great new buildings have been built - the History Faculty Library by James Stirling, the chapel at Fitzwilliam by Richard MacCormac, the Fitzwilliam College buildings by Denys Lasdun, Ralph Erskine's Clare Hall, Richard Sheppard's Churchill College. The list indicates an awareness and engagement with current practice that is exemplary. Without the faculty, one wonders, will this continue? We have to encourage the view that the world is something that we can make, not just make a living out of.

· The sculptor Antony Gormley is the creator of The Angel of the North

www.antonygormley.com

I'm surprised that there isn't more coverage of the Cambridge school on archinect, and no actual insider. Well, I'm an undergrad there and it's been a dramatic few months. I think I emailed you guys in the summer before it all started about participating in the school blog project but didn't get a reply. Anyway, the demo on Nov 29th was pretty successful. We got a lot of friends of other subjects to participate, mathematicians, engineers, historians... you name it. There were 1000+ people there throughout. Other departments and all the colleges are behind us as well. It was well covered in the media. Guardian's frontpage article obviously helped, and I had friends in Hong Kong calling me about it too, since apparently it made it into the papers there too. In the last week of term, the BBC came and filmed us during our crit, which was rather amusing.

Well, we ended the term with a sense of hope and uncertainty, since no matter how much we do the decision is still with the university. Now though, it's looking more positive. Here's an e-mail we got from our head of dept:

________________________________________

At the General Board's meeting this afternoon, the future of the Department
of Architecture was discussed. The outcome is positive insofar as the
Department will not be closed, but the General Board requires further
clarification on certain aspects of the financial package which the
Department prepared. We are confident that we will be able to resolve
these issues. Our reading is that there is strong support to retain
Architecture in the University and to provide the necessary funds for
strengthening its research.

Below is the text of a press statement issued this evening by the
Vice-Chancellor:


Statement from Professor Alison Richard, Vice-Chancellor of the University
of Cambridge, on the meeting of the General Board to consider its
recommendation concerning the Department of Architecture.

"The General Board today discussed proposals from the School of Arts and
Humanities concerning the future of the Department of Architecture. There
is much to welcome in the School?s report, which addresses the Board?s
concerns about achieving excellence in both research and teaching,
hallmarks of all academic activities at Cambridge.

"The Board wish to explore further some aspects of these proposals with the
Department and the School and expect to take forward an agreed plan at the
next meeting in January 2005. The Board reaffirms its commitment to
students seeking entry to the undergraduate Tripos in 2005 and 2006."


Thank you very much for your fantastic support.

Marcial Echenique
__________________________________________

Just to reiterate: no official decision has been reached, and in no way
should we be seen to be declaring victory or dancing in the streets...

We're quietly optimistic about the situation, but must are trying not to
antagonise the General Board in any way by pre-empting outright success (which isn;t that difficult since almost everyone's left Cambridge for Xmas now.)