An architecture school for Saskatchewan
U of S, Saskatoon touted as ideal ‘incubators for architectural education’

March 12, 2010

By Colleen MacPherson

Student demand is extremely high, potential faculty are available, space is not a problem and mid-sized cities like Saskatoon are perfect locations, all factors that bode well for the possible establishment of a school of architecture at the University of Saskatchewan.

The idea for such a school has been bandied about for years but it has only been in the last five or so that the Saskatchewan Association of Architects (SAA) has taken a serious look at the possibility. And now, a university committee is also considering how to end a nation-wide 40-year drought in the creation new opportunities for educating architects. For the man involved as both an architect and a U of S community member, this may well be a high point in his career.

Colin Tennent, associate vice-president of facilities and university architect, said he is “overjoyed” at the possibility of a new school. And although someone once called him “a pathological optimist,” a description he admits is fairly accurate, Tennent believes the U of S could be training architects in as little as two years.

In an interview with On Campus News, Tennent said the demand for architecture education has spiked in Canada, a country that has only about a dozen schools, the newest – the Northern Ontario School of Architecture at Laurentian University – set to open this year. “When I graduated (from the University of Calgary), I applied to about 200 offices before I got a job. Now, that’s completely turned around and students have jobs to choose from.”

More significant than demand is recent research that shows mid-sized cities are perfect incubators for architectural education, he said, environments open “to exciting, cutting-edge discovery. In Saskatchewan, our solutions tend to be binder twine by necessity so we’re innovative by nature. The potential here is difficult to fathom, and I believe Saskatoon is ready. We’re feeling a bit bound culturally, and a school is the perfect solution as a centre for growth and development.”

Despite the need for more architectural services, only one in 16,000 people in Saskatchewan are architects, Tennent said, “so we’re a rare breed.” And the province’s practicing architects are aging. Students must leave the province to study architecture “and most don’t come back so we’re hitting a wall.” All of these worrying facts came to light when Tennent and other members of the Council of Saskatchewan Architects, which governs the SAA, initiated that body’s first strategic plan. The proposed solution was a Saskatchewan school.

A feasibility study was done in 2008, he said, and the idea of a school was endorsed by the SAA in 2009. “The next step was to take the feasibility study to a deeper level,” to examine a school’s academic structure, resources, governance and community engagement. What emerged was an understanding that the U of S offers a perfect platform of support for the school from other disciplines like law, business, engineering, arts and the School of Environment and Sustainability.

“I’m also arguing that a lot of the issues facing architecture in this century are related public health. And the school of public policy should be involved too. Let’s do it right.”

In December, an internal group that includes representatives from of various academic units took a notice of intent to Council’s Planning and Priorities Committee outlining the potential fit of a school with the university’s priorities. Tennent said the group is working to define the school’s structure and curriculum, and to prepare a business case. A possible home for the school has been identified in the downtown core, he said, adding students – particularly architecture students – bring a unique vibrancy that enhances the entire community.

Tennent also imagines the school’s program developing an emphasis on indigeneity, “not in design necessarily, like re-thinking the teepee, but rather in its approach to some of the really pressing issues. Housing that takes into consideration the social dynamics within a culture is a pretty simple example but one that is applicable around the world.”

There is still a lot of ground to cover before the U of S opens the doors to a school of architecture but “I really feel a conviction for this,” said Tennent. “I know it’s going to work.”