Architecture
The 5-year Professional Architecture degree program now leads to a Master’s Degree.
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Architecture Curriculum
The Master of Architecture program is based firmly upon the complementary foundations of general and architectural education. We emphasize mastery of the knowledge, skills and understandings essential to the artful creation of buildings, spaces and places. The faculty seeks to assure our students extensive exposure to social, political, economic and technological perspectives that will aid them in functioning as effective leaders in a rapidly changing global context.
In emphasizing the architect’s role as a designer of environments that responsibility address individual and societal needs, the professional Master of Architecture curriculum includes a sequence of design studios providing holistic examination of environmental design issues. Courses in history, theory, human behavior, construction, structural and environmental systems, planning, programming, and professional practice compliment students work in a carefully orchestrated series of design studios.
Because the faculty believes students benefit from direct contact with environments from which vital insights can be gained, a diverse spectrum of field study opportunities is woven throughout the curriculum.
Short, carefully structured visits to cities in Kansas and nearby states during the first year of study introduce students to techniques of urban and architectural analysis and extend the range of their experience. Longer trips are taken in subsequent years. Second year students often travel to Dallas; third year students travel to Chicago or Los Angeles. Led by faculty, students visit leading architectural firms, contemporary and historical buildings of importance, and examine critical urban design features. Design studio project are often located in of the city visited, so the trips are also site visits, which provide opportunities for detailed urban analysis.
Fourth-year students have access to extended elective field study opportunities: including the 30-week Architectural Internship program; and semester-long foreign study programs in Italy, Australia, the Czech Republic or Denmark. During the last quarter century, the Architectural Internship program has served more than 800 students and 400 sponsors in 37 states, the District of Columbia, and Central America, Asia, Africa and Europe.
The College sponsors the Italian Studies Program which brings several dozen fourth-year students from each of our undergraduate degree programs and several of our faculty together in the Italian hill towns of Castiglion Fiorentino and Orvieto for a semester of collaborative design studio projects, seminars and travel across Italy.
A limited number of architecture students may elect to study during the spring semester of the fourth year in Prague, the Czech Republic, at Czech Technical University, in Copenhagen, Denmark, at Denmark’s International Study Program or at Geelong and Melbourne, Australia, at Deakin University. Semester-long visits to the Department of Architecture by exchange students from Czech Tech, Deakin and other international schools supplement the substantial diversity of our student body.
Architectural internship and foreign study students return with renewed purpose and fresh insights to share with fellow students and faculty during their final year of study for the Master of Architecture degree. during this year, students have the opportunity to explore projects in greater depth and detail than in their earlier years.
The professional Master of Architecture degree offers access to a broad array of career opportunities within the profession. The largest number of our graduates find employment with firms in private professional practice, providing a full range of services for clients in the planning, design and administration of construction projects. Most architectural practices work with a diverse array of clients, but an increasing number choose to focus their services on such fields as housing, health care, education, criminal justice, other building types, or adaptive use and preservation. Although some architects, especially those in very small firms, maintain responsibility for every aspect of professional practice, after a number of years most architects specialize in one or more areas of responsibility, for example, becoming project managers, designers, computing coordinators, or marketing experts.
In addition to private practice, some architects are directly involved in real estate development and construction. Facilities design and management for public and private agencies, corporations, and institutions is another opportunity that attracts many architects. Local, state and federal government offices also employ architects to plan and coordinate work with private design and planning firms. As our society grows more complex, new design challenges emerge which open additional career options for architects.
Some graduates continue their formal education opting for careers in research and teaching. Others enter allied fields such as landscape architecture, planning, engineering, development, construction and graphic or production design. Theater, film, television and computing attract architecture graduates, as do museums, display firms and architectural product and materials manufacturers.
Accreditation
The Kansas State University Master of Architecture degree is accredited by the National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB). Our professional degree and three years of appropriate practical experience qualify graduates for the Architectural Registration Examination (ARE) administered by each American state and territory to candidates who wish to become architects.
In the United States, most state registration boards require a degree from an accredited professional degree program as a prerequisite for licensure. The National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB), which is the sole agency authorized to accredit U.S. professional degree programs in architecture, recognizes three types of degrees: the Bachelor of Architecture, the Master of Architecture, and the Doctor of Architecture. A program may be granted a 6-year, 3-year, or 2-year term of accreditation, depending on the extent of its conformance with established educational standards.
Doctor of Architecture and Master of Architecture degree programs may consist of a pre-professional undergraduate degree and a professional graduate degree that, when earned sequentially, constitute an accredited professional education. However, the pre-professional degree is not, by itself, recognized as an accredited degree.
Kansas State University, College of Architecture Planning and Design, Department of Architecture offers the following NAAB-accredited degree programs:
B. Arch. (164 undergraduate credits) (through December 2011)
M. Arch. (140 undergraduate credits + 30 graduate credits)
Next accreditation visit for all programs: 2011
From the 2009 NAAB conditions and Procedures for Professional Degree programs in Architecture. Available at http://www.naab.org/accreditation/2009_Conditions.aspx
Visit the Department of Architecture Website: http://capd.ksu.edu/arch/