Course syllabus
Course Overview
ACE570 Reality Studio
VT24 (15 hp)
Course offered by the department of Architecture and Civil Engineering
Master’s Programme Architecture and Planning Beyond Sustainability /MPDSD
Contact details
Examiner/teacher: Liane Thuvander, liane.thuvander@chalmers.se, +46 762 275 857
Course coordinator/teacher: Shea Hagy, shea.hagy@chalmers.se, +46 709 847 067
Other teachers:
Lina Zachrisson, lina.zachrisson@chalmers.se +46 709 398 968
Jessica Lundin, jessica.lundin@chalmers.se +46 734 453 749
Advisors:
Emilio Brandao, brandao@chalmers.se
Course Location
There are 2 assigned working spaces for students in this course:
- Pre-Field Study Studio will be in Hammarkullen
- Hammarkulletorget 62B, 7th floor- the entrance is between the Folkets Hus and the library, take elevator or the stairs up to the 7th floor. The door code up there is: 8101.
- You can get to Hammarkullen with tram 4, 8 or 9 from the city centre and towards Angered, then get off at the station “Hammarkullen".
- Post-Field Study Studio will be at Chalmers
- Room SB-100
Note: Due to the international collaborations some of the events scheduled in the studio calendar before the field studies will be run online via Zoom.
Course purpose
The mission of the studio is for the students, through their coursework, develop and plan for the implementation of resilient, culturally appropriate, healthy and innovative design solutions that support dignified human everyday life. These design solutions are situated in real-world extreme environments (often in a challenging foreign context of a low- or middle-income country), and cocreated through collaboration with local communities, NGOs, universities, governmental institutions and other organisations. Reality Studio aims to bring students into close contact with a range of global perspectives and ethically sensitive questions, and to learn and co-create spatial design approaches and methods that deal with challenges such as urban poverty, injustice, climate adaptation, among others.
- UNSDGs: The studio relates to and focuses on the UN Sustainable Development Goals (17)
Course design
Reality Studio revolves around a field study where students immerse themselves in the local context and build collaborations with local actors. The 2024 Reality Studio aims to include a field study trip of 4-5 weeks in April-May, to 3 locations simultaneously (South Africa/Bangladesh/Kenya) where the studio will collaborate closely with local organisations and Universities on existing projects in local communities. Below is the planned structure:
- Pre-Field Study (weeks 12-14): During these weeks, together as a whole class, we will meet various stakeholders from around the world, while gaining knowledge on the different challenges and communities presented by the stakeholders and delving deep into each of the presented contexts. Lectures, literature seminars, discussions on ethics, power, agency and coloniality will be part of this introduction period.
- Field Study (weeks 15-18): The class will break into teams of about 4 students each based on interest and skills, each team will then travel to their respective sites. Together with the partners/ stakeholders, the teams will be challenged to develop and apply methods/tools to collect information and data to analyse the project sites, communities, and cases in order to contribute to the project with design interventions based on the needs of the project and community.
- Post-Field Study (weeks 19-23): Each project team will work to create and design spatially contextualized proposals to meet the needs and challenges of the project site/community. The design proposals will address different time and spatial scales, short + long term, small + large scale, and they will be based on the information collected during the field study and knowledge gained from the stakeholders. Finally, each team will document and package their work in a way that will be available and useful for the stakeholders to easily implement some of the solutions proposed.
Learning objective
Points of departure in the studio are everyday needs and activities of people, local businesses and communities in relation to a spatial context. The problems and possible solutions will vary significantly in different regions of the world. This will challenge the ability of the students in analyzing the local situation in a broader context as a basis for the choice, the approach and the implementation of their architectural and urban design projects. See specific Intended Learning Outcomes in the course syllabus on the student portal.
Masters Thesis Connection
The studio will also aim to provide the students with inspiration, ideas and contacts for eventual future projects within the students upcoming masters thesis, especially within the masters thesis direction Design Activism Beyond Borders.
Previous Projects
Some reports from previous student projects in Reality studio are available at Chalmers Open Digital Repository(ODR). For other previous projects, you can access them on CANVAS: Literature Folder/00_Previous RS Projects.
Examination form
As a minimum, to pass the course and receive a grade, you need:
- Presence at all scheduled activities is required. Some absence can be accepted if there are legitimate reasons (e.g. temporary sickness). In other cases, supplementary assignments have to be handed in in order to compensate for absence (e.g. written reviews on literature). Non-compensated absence will negatively influence the grades (Regarding missed deadlines or other compulsory activities, please contact the teachers for solution on how to compensate);
- Active participation at seminars, workshops and in group work;
- Course participation, hand-ins and assignments of sufficient quality (i.e. that fulfills the course objectives and specific requirements);
- Delayed submission of hand-ins without any approved motivation will negatively influence the grades;
- Electronic course evaluations should be filled in.
The expected student’s submissions in the studio in order to pass is divided into 2 groups:
- Hand-ins – non-graded compulsory submissions:
- Assignments – compulsory and graded (Fail, 3, 4, or 5), either individual or group submissions:
For grading details, see RS_Evaluation matrix 2024.pdf
Course Representatives
- Anjuli Grüschow
- Albina Lampa
- Josua Ernvik
- Moa Lindahl
- Tove Källander
- Xifeng Xi
Notes from the course representative meeting 20th May 2024
Schedule
For the detailed and updated daily schedule, please check you the course canvas calendar.
Course summary:
| Date | Details | Due |
|---|---|---|