Architecture Program Report Tulane University New Orleans ...

to teach courses within the school.
As a distinguished urban institution, Tulane University aggressively
pursues an active and meaningful relationship with both the City of New
Orleans and the region. Hence, student and faculty research within the
context of the urban environment is encouraged and supported. This is
clearly the case across all departments of the university; hence, the
engagement of the university with its larger context influences the School
of Architecture, which in turn, influences the steady inquiry into the
multiple environments that effect society-at-large. Therefore, students
are actively encouraged to pursue coursework in other areas of the
university, while the faculty and administration are also engaged in
establishing and developing meaningful curricular and extracurricular
interactions with other departments. In addition, students and faculty
serve on numerous university-wide committees and governing boards,
furthering the TSA’s contributions to the university and social fabric in
general.
Architecture Education and the Students
In focusing its mission on the codependency of teaching and learning,
the School of Architecture stresses that the educational forum is only the
beginning of a life-long learning process. Hence, the emphasis is not
only on the products of architectural research, but on the efficacy of the
process.
Within the curriculum, it is recognized that certain aspects of the
discipline are more effectively showcased within the traditional university
setting—history, theoretical distillation, abstract research—while others
are better understood according to the parameters of unmediated
environments: empirical research associated with ‘the real world’. The
School of Architecture seeks to establish an understanding of and
engagement with both areas of research—the abstract and the empirical
—by testing them relative to one another. Thus, structures and
technology are taught both abstractly and empirically, within designated
courses and again within the studio laboratory. Likewise, history is
understood as a series of codified periods and social conditions, while
being viewed in situ through a wide variety of field research programs.
From the beginning of their educational career, students are encouraged
to enjoin the faculty in assuming a degree of responsibility for their own
education. While the early years depend largely on the dissemination of
information and the acquisition of knowledge and skills, the later years
require the students to establish a research by which and through which
their burgeoning knowledge and experience can be applied. Students
are affirmed both as individuals and as members of a larger community.
This community is not only the School of Architecture, its faculty, staff,
administration, and student body, but society at large. Hence, while
diversity and identity are actively fostered formally and informally,
cooperative efforts on the part of students are encouraged in numerous
ways. Within the institutional framework of Tulane University, the School
of Architecture promotes difference through an engagement of a widevariety
of perspectives. The composition of faculty, staff, and student