<p>oh, i'm just seeing this: the pencil sharpener thing is a great idea. it sounds very expressive.</p>
<p>hi, jcro2006, hope you received it this time. goodness, i didn't save it! hope you got it.</p>
<p>Here are SRMom3's reality checks again for those who can't browse through these 28 tedious pages for such great, insightful advice, here are they:</p>
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<p>Let me begin by saying I am an architect, licensed since 1982, as well as the head of the architecture program at our local community college, I am also married to an architect. I regularly advise students on transfer and graduate school admissions. Last year's students include 1 at Cooper, 1 at Rice, 3 at IIT, and 2 at UIC. We are in the Chicago suburbs.</p>
<p>Reality check #1-Though architecture is a wonderful, creative activity it is a group process, you have to coordinate with many people, some brilliant, some arrogant, some average etc.</p>
<p>Reality check #2-In general the B.Arch is considered less prestigious and more of a vocational approach than the B.A. + M. Arch. The M.Arch is necessary for teaching.</p>
<p>Reality check #3-All architects must complete an internship period of 2-3 years minimum before taking the exams which usually take 1 to 1 1/2 years to complete. Until you are licensed you are not an architect.</p>
<p>Reality check #4-A minimum of 75% of the work of architects is in something other than design. Architects spend huge amounts of time negotiating with clients and contractors, researching materials, coordinating with engineers, preparing code analysis, construction details etc. If you like solving puzzles and enjoy a never ending series of "what if..." questions you are a likely candidate for architecture.</p>
<p>Reality check #5-Architects don't make much money! Repeat architects don't make much money! Starting salaries vary with region, 40 k in Boston is a lot less than in St Louis, but whereever you are it won't be enough. It never is a lot unless you are the principal of the firm. When you are you find you are spending time reviewing contracts and insurance policies and are even more removed from the work of architecture.</p>
<p>Reality check #6-Architecture school rankings are not that important. You will always have your portfolio, this shows what YOU can do. A school name is important to support someone in a field with less tangible products. The school name is not meaningless but less important than other fields. You will all begin as "computer jockies" anyway so make sure you have concrete production skills. The school ranking link on a previous post begins with this quote; "Any school with a score of three or less. They may be the best teaching schools in the world, they may be producing the most sought-after architectural employees: but they are not the planet's intellectual leaders." One of the schools with 3 or less is the Cal College of Art, a very good school that also had the highest pass rate for the ARE, Architectural Registration Exam, of any school in California a couple of years ago. Make sure you know what the statistics you are looking at are telling you. Data analysis is a critical skill for architects. (As is communication, Fallingwater you need to work on language skills or proofread your posts)</p>
<p>Reality check #7-All architecture programs have a terrific attrition rate. The typical line at the freshman orientation assembly is "look to your left, look to your right, only one of you will graduate". 33% is actually optimistic it is probably less. Why? The combination of art and science the reality of the professional experience and compensation ends up dissuading many people. </p>
<p>So what does it mean? Go in with your eyes open, every architecture student thinks they are the ONE. We all start out arrogant, read the Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand or look up what Tom Wolfe has to say about architects in the Right Stuff or Bauhaus to My House. Choose a school with a solid program, in the area of the country you want to work in, check out it's licensing stats, check out the faculty, go and visit. If every student's work looks the same run, they are a school that thinks they know the answer, if you disagree you will be miserable. Give up on a social life. Forget double majors. Your design studio will expect you to work on architecture every minute available. More than 2/3 of my architecture faculty is married to architects. Why? Because they were the only people we ever saw. When I was a student I shared a house with pre-law, pre-med, english, and engineering students. NO ONE worked anywhere near the amount of architecture students. Architecture students routinely have 24/7 access to their building. </p>
<p>If you love architecture go for it. I can't imagine anything else that would make me happy. One of the reasons I chose it was that it would give me a field that would always be challenging, that would never be mastered, It has lived up to my expectations
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<p>wow, this is cool. again and again. [joe valerie is also married to an architect...]</p>
<p>Here again guys, I've reposted Rabioso's post dated 06-17-2005, 12:06 AM on page 16 of this thread. It does not necessarily reflect my opinions, but I believe it makes for a very interesting read. And guys remember that all are entitled to their opinions. This is Rabioso's story, enjoy:</p>
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<p>What a joke!!!! You!? </p>
<p>In my opinion, 95% of people posting here do not even come close to have the potential of becoming a decent architect.</p>
<p>It is a sad thing to read these threads and all I hear is how much money is to be made in Architecture. Architecture will be You. You become a priest of Architecture. Your family and life will revolve around architecture. Anything else and you will be a mediocre architect destroying our built environment. It is vulgar to ask how much money you will make in Architecture, it is pitiful to aspire to graduate from a top university in order to be hired by a so called top firm. You see, there are no top firms in architecture; there are no standards to measure who is the Best Architect. Top Firms are merely factories of mass production of cloned construction documents that heartlessly degrade and prostitute our evolution. </p>
<p>Architecture is independent, architects are free beings. Architecture is your greatest hate and your greatest love.</p>
<p>Expect the following: Expect to be poor or compromise your integrity. Expect to work even in your sleep. Expect 90% of your work time spent in everything except design. Expect to be well traveled. Expect to be patient. Expect to read and study feverously, for the rest of your life. Expect to be divorced. Expect to live life intensely. Expect to be the happiest person alive. </p>
<p>If you have the slightest doubt in pursuing Architecture, it is not for you.</p>
<p>My father is a Medical Doctor with three Ph.D. degrees. He has patients from all over the world and is on call 24 hours a day, yet he often tells me, that he does not know another profession that requires so much dedication and total devotion as in Architecture.</p>
<p>I realized, after 2 years of attending college for architecture, that my heroes in architecture had either dropped out or never attended architecture school. I have been working in the field for 10 years and I am finally being commissioned work that is very interesting. Some of my friends from college graduated and attended Ivy League Master Programs and are currently working for Top Firms. I have seen their passion for architecture die and they succumb to the pressures of the real world, yet they still work robotically in a profession they once loved. Please read about the lives of the great architects and discover how their passion and love for the profession grew, and how they tirelessly worked until the day they died. </p>
<p>If you want to become an ethical architect you will marry architecture, you will become an apostle and priest of architecture. If you like building pretty things and like making money go ahead become a General Contractor, you really do not need a lot of knowledge for that.</p>
<p>I am poor often exhausted but extremely happy. I love Architecture.
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<p>rabioso's post sounds intense, harsh, and a little dramatic - but you know, and that's cool.</p>
<p>It's all about showing your creativity and getting you to think outside of the box.</p>
<p>regarding the part about spending 90% of our time on stuff other than design... can't some others who have no interest in design do whatever....contracts, documents for us?</p>
<p>Very, very few architecture students or architects prefer to do anything but design. The majority of time on a project is detailing etc. A good designer needs to know how buildings really work. If you don't your designs end up compromised by the requirements of code, cost, materials etc. To be "The Designer" you need to be the very best. Maybe 1 in 50 architects spend most of their time on design. If you don't want to do the nuts and bolts you should probably look at a different field.</p>
<p>ohh.....that's much better than what i thought it would be! i wanted more than just the aesthetic stuff anyways~</p>
<p>jrock, how is your portfolio coming along?
i'm having a hard time presenting sketches in an interesting way....</p>
<p>you bet! having a hard time, too. but i'm retaining about 7 from my last portfolio. i've got 2 more pieces, now. it's not easy but there are times when you get a burst of inspiration and you do something surprisingly nice. just be patient...really, cos you've got the stuff in you, but, yeah, it could be very frustrating at times when what you expect doesn't come out the way you want...it's a rough road. i still have about 6 more to do. but the bulk of those will be photos. i've got 4 pencil drawings. and if some are really good along the way, i may throw out some not-so-good stuff...</p>
<p>you're retaining only 7 from your last portfolio? there must be a major update and improvement! are you including sketches? it's almost impossible to get them to look professional without reproducing them one by one....ahhhh</p>
<p>well, i do studies. but i have a recent sketch of my sister half asleep in bed...not much, but i'm not so sure if i should include it yet. yeah, sure, you can always retouch the sketches...do you sketch with microtip pens/brush/water? i have two pencil drawn portraits. a pencil drawng of the corner of my living room, and one of an oryx in the savanna [from a photo]...</p>
<p>i don't want to include sketches really...i just want to sneak something in that will pobably make up for the free hand drawing requirement from cornell....what do you like to use?</p>
<p>i still have to sit down with those essays - and this Collegeboard official sat book thing...</p>
<p>yeah. my studies - portraits, still-life are all free-hand drawings. or does free-hand mean something else? please tell me, thx...</p>
<p>what does Cornell mean by freehand drawings? are they to be drawings of objects? what are the subjects of your sketches...</p>
<p>i'm supposing it's anything that is like....sketched? i really don't know if paintings count or not, and i only have one charcoal 'freehand' without rulers and stuff...that is why i will try to present a few sketches, but they don't look like they belong</p>
<p>well, then i guess all but 2 are freehand drawings. i'm dull with a brush, lol. don't have a single painting! i meant sketching with a microtip pen. then using a brush dipped in water to smduge the still wet ink to create tone.</p>
<p>hey guys. I'm a senior in high school and starting to apply to colleg. I'm going to go into architecture and wanted to know your opininos on the following schools:
University of Michigan
University of Illinois
Wash U
Miami of Ohio
Miami University</p>
<p>Thanks,
Melissa</p>