Architecture

The course relates the abstract field of architecture with the built works of prominent architects who explain, firsthand, the details of their design and the corresponding construction process. It discusses the connection between the preliminary architectural idea and the resulting space, as well as the relationship between construction detail and process in order to understand the various stages and strategies required to create a building.

The International Internship course develops vital business skills employers are actively seeking in job candidates. This course is comprised of two parts: an internship, and a hybrid academic seminar. Students are placed in an internship within a sector related to their professional ambitions. The hybrid academic seminar, conducted both online and in-person, analyzes and evaluates the workplace culture and the daily working environment students experience. The course is divided into eight career readiness competency modules as set out by the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE), which guide the course’s learning objectives. During the academic seminar, students reflect weekly on their internship experience within the context of their host culture by comparing and contrasting their experiences with their global internship placement with that of their home culture. Students reflect on their experiences in their internship, the role they have played in the evolution of their experience in their internship placement, and the experiences of their peers in their internship placements. Students develop a greater awareness of their strengths relative to the career readiness competencies, the subtleties and complexities of integrating into a cross-cultural work environment, and how to build and maintain a career search portfolio.

The course develops students' understanding of key building physics principals and the role they play in achieving satisfactory indoor environmental conditions. The course equips students with detailed knowledge of, and the ability to apply, the main scientific principles of heat and mass transfer, light and sound in the building engineering context. Students consider what is meant by indoor environmental quality and explore how the design of the building envelope and building systems can influence the internal environment and building energy use.

Often referred to as the "age of improvement," the Victorian era was one of unprecedented growth and development. The Victorians not only benefited from the technological advantages afforded by the full flowering of the Industrial Revolution but also enjoyed the profits that came with Britain's economic and political rise to world dominance. With this rise came profound social change as politicians, academics, social reformers, manufacturers, and religious leaders vied to institute new sensibilities regarding morality, spirituality, science, charity, education, and political representation. This transformation naturally affected the type and style of buildings that were erected during this period, dramatically altering the character of Britain's rural and urban landscapes. This course considers the architectural consequences of these transformations by exploring the development of theories and practices in architecture in the context of the social and cultural changes (and challenges) that gave rise to them. Although the Victorian era may be seen to have come to a close with the death of Queen Victoria in 1901, the course concludes by examining how these transformations were carried through and further developed in the first decade of the 20th century leading up to the First World War.