DBEI, or Reality Architecture
If you’re an entering freshman this year, or generally new to the cult of architecture, you might not know about DBEI. The Design Build Evaluate Initiative (commonly referred to as design-build) is an old idea that several of our faculty here at CoAD have been valiantly promoting for decades. Design-build is the academic version of a real design project where students cooperate with faculty and even other disciplines throughout the University and community to research, design, and construct AN ACTUAL BUILDING.
In 2005, CoAD initiated a shift towards PERMANENT-not-installations-not-cool-temporaryshelves-not-mockups-not-soon-to-be-trashed-PERMANENT buildings. The founding father of this new attitude towards DBEI is the one and only Professor Robert French. You may know him from First Year studio. You may have only seen him in the atrium (he’s the one with the white beard). However you know or don’t know him, Professor French was the catalyst for a program that now spans a large portion of the faculty as well as the Colleges of Landscape, Engineering, Nursing, Communications, and Graphic Design, to name a few.
So UTK CoAD has been slowly and persistently building up its permanent DBEI program over the last 7 years. Why, you might ask? They do it so that YOU, UNSULLIED FRESHMAN OR ENTERING GRADUATE STUDENT, WILL HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO BUILD A REAL BUILDING! This is no lie; coming down the tube are several extremely promising projects involving construction research, 4-H camps, Appalachian infrastructure design, and even Haitian clinics. This is the timeto keep an ear turned and look for the opportunities to get your name on a cool project to work with, learn from, and eventually show off to future employers.
Go forth and build, my comrades.
submitted by Haley Allen