<p>Nitsua, sorry I did not see your question sooner. Is the market going to be good for architects? I don’t have a crystal ball, but I can tell you what I am seeing.</p>
<p>The last five years have been brutal and I bet that nationally we have lost at least 25% of the architectural workforce. They either retired or found something else to do. Then you look at the number of graduates who could not find a job and moved on to some other career and you have a workforce that has resized down to accommodate low volumes of work. As the market starts to return to more normal levels we are going to have a real shortage of people.</p>
<p>The economy seems to be coming back, commercial projects (apartment buildings, office buildings, retail centers, condos, etc.) have really picked up in the last six months. However the growth is a bit uneven. In Texas we are booming, we have ads out for seven people in our Dallas office. The Denver office is really doing well, but Tampa and Atlanta are just beginning to see an upturn. So you are gong to have to do what architects have always done: go where the jobs are.</p>
<p>I’m pretty optimistic about job prospects for graduates right now. Hopefully they will remain strong when you graduate. The long term trends are certainly strong.</p>
<p>rick12, thanks very much! Another question, if you don’t mind - are there specific classes/minors you like to see or look for? I hear minors aren’t important at all, but skills learned from certain classes can be valuable.</p>
<p>For instance, these are the minors offered by the College of Architecture and Environmental Design:
I was originally considering Construction Management or Architectural Engineering. I talked to my grandpa, who was an iron worker and worked on the Mondavi Center at UC Davis. He said the architectural engineering minor would be useful, because he had a lot of experiences with architects that wouldn’t be told their designs wouldn’t work/couldn’t be built/etc. I also think the extra math involved in an architectural engineering minor might be valuable - I’m not crazy about math, but I could see it being beneficial. </p>
<p>Or on the other hand I could minor in Astronomy or Geology, both of which I would really enjoy. Astronomy would give a better understanding of physics (which likely would not be applicable to architecture), and Geology would obviously teach me more about the earth.</p>
<p>If you LOVE the art and design of buildings, then go for Architecture. If you love math and physics, go for Engineering. I personally love both so much, so I majored in Architectural Engineering. The major both teaches about Architecture, structures, and the other aspects of engineering. However, Architectural engineering is pretty limited, and not all universities have this program. I’m currently a freshman at University Of miami. Other universities like Penn state, University of colorado at Boulder, University of Texas, at Austin, Drexel University … And few more, offer this major. I would really recommend majoring in this program only if you like both. Goodluck !</p>
<p>Nitsua, I m not sure the minor makes that big of a difference. For certain firms a construction management minor would be attractive, but perhaps not for others. I would minor in something you really enjoy.</p>
<p>Hey Rick. I am a junior in High School in Texas. I love the design part of Architecture, but I am really looking for a job where I can comfortably live with a family at 80 to 100k per year. Will I get this from Architecture or do I need to take Architectural Engineering? Is there any way I can work both the design and the construction documents in the same job post college while making the salary I would like or do I need to choose? Will a MArch be something that will allow me to do both jobs with? Also, based on your answer, what schools in and nearby Texas do you recommend for the degree? Finally, I am looking for a scholarship to pay most of my schooling, and that really is the deciding factor on what college I go to, so do you have advice for getting those scholarships or advice on schools that would be more inclined to give those scholarships out?
Sorry for all the questions, and thanks in advance.</p>
<p>Can you make $80 to $100k per year as an architect? Yes, pretty easily. In our office you might make that 8-12 years out of school. Some specialties such as healthcare design pay even more.</p>
<p>What you will find is that there is a significant and growing gap between smaller and larger firms. This gap includes pay, technology, benefits, stability, etc. If you are looking for financial compensation and stability look at some of the larger firms.</p>
<p>You can do both design and construction documents in the same job, but you need to find a firm that is not departmentalized. Find one with a studio setup where the same team follows the project from start to finish.</p>
<p>As far as Texas architecture schools my ranking list starting with the best would be;</p>
<p>Rice
UT Austin
UT Arlington
University of Houston
Texas Tech
Texas A&M</p>
<p>You have lots of choices, hopefully one of them will give you a scholarship.</p>
<p>My daughter has decided she would like to become a licensed Architect and she is currently a senior in High School. She has taken the summer Architecture discovery program at University of Notre Dame and she loved it. She would really like to attend a school in Texas and ultimately live in Texas. She has been accepted to: Tulane, SMU and Southwestern University. She has been offered nice scholarships from all three. </p>
<p>Right now her favorite option is Southwestern University + UT Austin MArch (as a possibility). This will probably take 7 years (she will test out of 8+ AP classes). Southwestern offers a minor in Architecture and Design.</p>
<p>Is this a good option to chose SU+UT Austin (MArch) over a BArch at Tulane or even ND (if she gets accepted)?</p>
<p>Background on Southwestern per their website:
“To date the program has a 100% acceptance rate of getting students admitted to design graduate schools in fields of architecture, interior design, industrial design, landscape architecture, construction contracting, engineering and urban planning, and students have gone to graduate schools at Harvard, Yale, U.T. Austin, Clemson, UCLA, Univ. Houston, Univ. of Arizona, U.T. Arlington and Washington Univ., St. Louis. Many graduates have found themselves design project leaders at leading firms within ten years of leaving SU.”</p>
<p>An MArch from UT Austin is at least the equivalent to BArch from ND and Tulane, and arguably better. So if she wants the liberal arts experience and doesn’t mind the seven years, then SU and UT would be a really strong preparation to enter the field. Frankly, you have no bad choices: all three schools are great.</p>
<p>I am in Architectural engineering school at Okstate and I must say Architectural Engineering(AE) is a big umbrella term as with any engineer. For instance, a petroleum engineer is a branch of chemical engineering. There are 3 specializations I know of for AE. Those are structural engineering , which is what PSU focuses on ; however, we are now planning on adding 2 other branches, one of those being mechanical, electrical and plumbing(MEP), and those are some rare people out there and they make a ton of money. The third I know of is construction project management and this is different than construction management. Whichever branch of engineering under AE you choose, they all have to do with buildings. Civil engineering deals with bridges and roads etc, however there is much overlap with AE in Arch and civil. They are all five year degrees. You don’t need to know if you want to be an arch or AE until professional school (3rd year). To name a few differences, Arch’s take all the studio design classes, only Calc 1 and trig based physics, while AEs take a few of those design classes plus Calc 1-3 and differential equations, chem for engineers, steel 1 and 2, concretes and all those other materials, foundations, Calc based physics 1 and 2, thermodynamics etc. I say go to school undecided between the 2 and figure out if you’d rather have more math and physics or design studios (which I hate because they are tougher than math)</p>
<p>Hi Rick12! Could you give us an update on how you view the outlook going forward for future architects? My son is finishing freshman as ARCE at Cal Poly. MAJOR part of first yr is studio–arch & ARCE students all together. Before going on in his education my son is doing soul searching–stay ARCE or consider changing to arch. Your insight into the profession going forward would be very much appreciated. Thank you.</p>
<p>MaineLonghorn, hi there! Just posted to rick12 for his insights for architecture graduates going forward. I’d really appreciate your thoughts on ARCE going forward as well. My son (ARCE) is finishing freshman year at CalPoly in California. He has been living arch studio. It’s takes EVERY bit of these kids 1st year. He’s loved the community of kids he’s been working with. Structures start full on next year. I’ve asked him to really soul search which path seems best fit for him going forward, as this would be the time to talk w advisors if he has any desire to change majors. Thoughts about your life as structural engineer would be appreciated. Thank you.</p>
<p>The economy is definitely improving. 2013 was a rough year for us, but we’re staying busy now. Structural engineering has been a good career for my husband and me. We run our firm out of our home office. We work on a wide variety of projects, everything from houses to hospitals to top secret structures to community centers in the Dominican Republic. We like the structural engineering community, too - it’s cooperative and friendly. The hardest part is educating clients as to why they NEED a structural engineer. Builders will say, “I’ve been doing this for 25 years - why should I hire you?” So we need to have good communication and teaching skills!</p>
<p>kschall, I’m not rick (nor am I an architect) but I’m the mother of a recent M.Arch graduate. The experience of my son and his M.Arch and B.Arch classmates is that the job market is definitely looking up. They were able to find the kind of jobs they wanted – as architectural interns, in academia or in related tech fields – at livable salaries i. </p>
<p>Not every firm is thriving, but quite a few are getting enough new projects to start recruiting again. Judging by where my son’s friends ended up, this seems to be the case all over the country</p>
<p>The key to finding a job on graduation is to secure summer internships and to establish relationships with visiting professors and alumni/ae who are practicing architects. If your son’s on the fence between architecture and engineering perhaps he could get some architecture exposure over the summer – an internship or a career exploration session at an architecture school.</p>
<p>For sure, architecture isn’t a get-rich-quick path. Advanced degrees can be very costly and the licensing process can add another 4 to 5 years; however, those who love it, continue to love it. My son’s been on the job for about 6 months and he couldn’t imagine doing anything else.</p>
<p>Do you mean “building design and construction” by “running your own business”?</p>
<p>If people eager to start their own business in the future,
which major should they choose to help them achieve that goal, Structual Engineering or Civil Engineering? </p>
<p>or let’s put it in this way: What is the common path for people in this industry to start their own business?</p>