The shifting focus of architectural education means change is guaranteed, but beyond that lie more questions than answers, finds Eleanor Young
‘We are going to see change coming in over the next few years,’ says Jenny Russell, RIBA director of education and learning. ‘It’ll be a slow process and that is a good thing.’
This decade of change will gradually filter down into practices. It has begun with the Architects Registration Board changes and university responses to them, with many architecture schools reviewing their course offer. With new structures it seems likely the flow of Part 1 and Part 2 students that has defined architectural practice over the years will be reduced.
The background: in 2024 the ARB announced it was to focus on registering courses at master’s level and above only (Part 2 and 3). The news, with the tagline of the end of Part 1, 2, and 3, has had the unhappy side effect of undermining the status of architecture degrees. (RIBA will continue to use the terms and recognise architecture courses at Part 1, 2 and 3, and the value of an undergraduate degree in architecture, and maintain a system that is recognised worldwide.)
Its impact is playing out in the context of real-terms funding cuts and fewer lucrative international students, in an unstable university sector that is cutting an estimated 10,000 staff to address deficits.
More ARB changes are to come, with a commission on Professional Practical Experience having taken evidence and due to make recommendations for consultation shortly. Part 3 course directors are holding their collective breath – having been advised to wait on those recommendations.
Structural changes to education
There is still debate about whether this reform will achieve its aims. Speaking at Interface 3, RIBA’s recent symposium on education and practice, Lee Ivett, head of the Grenfell-Baines Institute of Architecture at the University of Central Lancashire (UCLAN) was outspoken in his critique of ‘ill considered reforms… [and] a misguided obsession with structure.’ Other heads of architecture are looking at how to adapt.
A late 2024 RIBA survey showed the institutions offering architecture courses are already feeling disruption, with over a quarter either planning major changes, for example a new MArch, or unsure about their course plans.
Some active options on the table are integrated degree and master’s programmes, which would run straight through from first to final year, without a year out in either five or a reduced four years, and courses combining a master’s and professional practice. Most plans are still under wraps, though the University of East London has made public its plans for a version of a combined course bringing together Part 2 master’s and Part 3 professional practice.
Impact on practice experience
Combined and shorter courses are likely to lead to less practical experience at early stages for students of architecture, and that practical experience would likely be delivered in shorter periods within the course structures. This would make for a different sort of profession and make the relationship between practice and future architects, which has enlivened practices for many years, less close.
‘We love our Part 1 students,’ says Sasha Bhavan of small practice Knox Bhavan. ‘They bring a lightness to the practice with their love of models and exploration, and they bring technology.’
‘Will typical tasks undertaken by year-out students end up landing on the shoulders of post-Part 2 students?’, asks Russell. If practice has to operate with fewer Part 1 students, will there be bored Part 2 students or will AI pick up the slack?
Ivett of UCLAN picks up the thread: ‘Should we really supply a student after a four years combined master’s and pay a minimum wage or do we have to step up and pay what they deserve?’ Alternatively, will practice leaders need to set up alternative progression pathways for recruits?
Reducing the churn of incoming students, and committing to employing future architects on a permanent basis without the ‘try before you buy’ that Part 1 has provided over the years, also means difficult conversations about under performance or cultural fit can’t be dodged by the imminent departure of a Part 1 student. And that the leeway Part 1 employees give to small practices to expand or contract without the painful process of redundancy is reduced.
On the upside there would be less employee churn and less need for an annual cycle of training and mentoring.
Perhaps the most significant impact would be if Part 2 master’s students landed in studios after four or five years of architecture education with barely any experience in practice. This can already be an issue with Part 1 students. At the symposium, one third year student mentioned the consensus at their table of students: ‘Employers need to be more forgiving and foster students over the experience gap.’
It is hard to discern the future in this period of change. ‘But it may be that students will continue to seek out practice experience and Part 1 jobs will continue to be advertised,’ says Russell.
What education will employees have?
The ARB registration focus on master’s and above comes with the initial aim of opening up access to students who haven’t taken a degree course in architecture – say from planning, construction or even film. It leaves decisions about who to accept onto a master’s in architecture in the hands of the institution offering it. The RIBA survey shows a significant number of institutions looking at, or interested in exploring, architectural access courses for students transferring into the discipline at master’s level, though the only one public is Kingston University.
For practices this means they may want to take a closer look at the CVs of Part 2 students or even qualified architects as the cohort comes through, and perhaps focus more closely on what different skills applicants might have with a thorough interrogation of their portfolio. Practices will also need to understand where unexpected knowledge gaps might be – things that would typically be covered in a degree course in architecture.
Student loans
Frustratingly for the ARB’s intention of increasing the diversity of entrants to the profession, the funding does not match. Architecture students in England have a special deal, so the more generous degree-level loans (£9,535 a year) continue through the master’s course.
But this will only apply to those taking degrees in architecture. Students who have taken on other undergraduate degrees will only be eligible for the loan of £12,471 per course when they reach master’s level – split over two years. This leaves switchers to architectural master’s worse off.
Apprenticeships
Apprenticeships are the training that is most deeply embedded in practice and practical experience. There are a small number of level 6 degree apprenticeships in architecture, but the majority are level 7, covering master’s study. At the RIBA symposium Scott Brownrigg’s Elizabeth Akamo spoke confidently of her experience going through an apprenticeship with strong support, accelerated learning and a certain acceptance of mistakes.
Yet all the signs are that the government is focusing apprenticeship funding on the lower education levels in its upcoming review. The RIBA is one of the voices petitioning it to continue to support this valuable route. It described them as ‘an additional access route for people from underrepresented groups to participate in built environment professions, ensuring a wide range of voices and experiences are reflected in the communities and places we create’.
Though hard work for the student, it changes the story on the cost of studying, with no fees and the apprentice supported with an income. While there are only a limited number of practices offering apprenticeships the loss would be a blow to them and the investment they have put into the scheme, as well as to potential applicants.
How students are taught
In this time of flux in universities, exactly how students are being taught is up for discussion. Studio space is always under threat. ‘Architectural education is being dictated by university estate teams,’ warns UCLAN’s Lee Ivett, who prefers all learning to be embedded in studio teaching with practical application.
Professor Alex Wright, head of architecture at the University of Bath, is determined to safeguard resources for studio learning. He used RIBA’s education and practice symposium to float the idea that the broadcast elements of teaching, primarily lectures, could be delivered efficiently across institutions with experts from relevant areas pooling recorded lectures.
Meanwhile Steven Coombs, director of undergraduate teaching at the Welsh School of Architecture, raises the alarm about the 50 competencies now explicitly demanded of students. ‘They don’t fit what architecture does,’ he says. ‘And we won’t know the implications until graduates start coming through.’