Temple University is located in Philadelphia, one of America’s great cities. It and architectural practice within it are currently being transformed by forces of global restructuring in ways comparable with that of other mid-sized post industrial cities around the world. Our pedagogy and research are framed by this urban and professional condition. The city is used as a primary laboratory for deep critical engagement, architectural investigation, operative transformation and application to global opportunities.

Central to work in the department is the recognition of architecture as a material practice, in which acts of design and acts of making extend into one another. These include drawing, model building, fabrication and building. This locates the department’s laboratories – studios, woodshop, digital and fabrication labs and a materials library, as well as design-build as a pedagogical method, at the heart of its ethos and pedagogy. In addition, the department promotes research into architecture’s material and technical properties. These include conventional materials and technologies as well as emerging materials and new computational and fabrication techniques.

Fundamental to architecture is design, a speculative practice that operates on the real to know and transform it. The design studio, from foundation level where students learn basic design and representational skills to advanced level comprehensive and urban studios, provides a critical environment for architectural speculation. These are supported by the study of theoretical, historical, technical and professional phenomena relevant to contemporary architectural and urban practice.

Finally, the department operates from the position that architecture is a collaborative practice. Collaborations with other centers of excellence for teaching and research in the university are encouraged. Pedagogy and research are connected to real conditions through partnerships or collaborations with other urban agents eg. planners, developers, political activists, researchers, fabricators, artists and other professionals. In this way, architectural education ensures its relevance to the transforming world of practice. Applied research and consultancy are encouraged.

The Architecture Department offers two degrees: the five-year accredited Bachelor of Architecture (B Arch), and the four-year non-accredited BS in architecture studies. Students are selected for the B Arch degree at the end of their sophomore year. The BS degree prepares students for careers in allied professions such as construction management, real estate and interior design. The B Arch degree program, fully accredited since 1979, prepares students for professional careers in architecture. Graduates with a B Arch will pursue an internship with a registered architecture firm that leads to licensure.

Licensure and Accreditation Information
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 US professional degree programs in architecture, recognizes two types of degrees: the Bachelor of Architecture and the Master of Architecture. A program may be granted a six-year, three-year, or two-year term of accreditation, depending on its degree of conformance with established educational standards. Masters degree programs may consist of a pre-professional undergraduate degree and a professional graduate degree, which, when earned sequentially, comprise an accredited professional education. However, the pre-professional degree is not, by itself, recognized as an accredited degree.

Lindsay Bremner