Spring 2017 CityStudioSTL Faculty Course Grants
2017-05-17 • Liz Kramer
Fall 2016 Segregation by Design students and faculty at the exhibition opening in Olin Library.
The Sam Fox School has awarded two 2017 CityStudioSTL Faculty Course Grants, which are intended to encourage community-engaged teaching in St. Louis. Faculty proposed mutually beneficial collaborations involving organizations, agencies, or individuals outside of Washington University. A jury of faculty and community engagement staff awarded funding up to $2,000 to support the following fall 2017 courses:
Segregation by Design: A Historical Analysis of the Impact of Planning and Policy in St. Louis (A46 ARCH 457B)
Taught by assistant professor Catalina Freixas and Mark Abbott of Harris-Stowe State University, the second iteration of this course seeks to examine the role of planning and design in fostering and maintaining segregation in American cities, including St. Louis. Students will create specific neighborhood plans to address challenges facing St. Louis communities, supported by mentors from both design and the humanities. In the inaugural year of this course, students explored a particular neighborhood in the St. Louis region, analyzing and mapping historical, demographic, and environmental data. Each team then made a proposal to mitigate issues of segregation faced by the community. The course is presented as part of The Divided City, a four-year urban humanities initiative organized by the Sam Fox School and the Center for the Humanities in Arts & Sciences, with support from the Mellon Foundation.
Constructing Ideas (A46 ARCH 462N)
This course, led by visiting professor Jan Ulmer, will examine the design and construction process as research. Students will work with UrbArts, a nonprofit organization that provides opportunities for marginalized artists and youth, fueled by the belief that empowering artists will uplift communities. UrbArts will develop a list of requested displays, such as stages, walls, or desks. Following in-depth exploration of the artwork and experience of UrbArts, students will develop and realize these displays to support the organization’s mission and programs. The final displays will be completed for UrbArts’ First Friday celebration in December 2017, and the built installations will be available for use by organization in the future. The course will run in fall 2017. For a previous iteration of this course, which ran in fall 2016, students designed and realized interactive, site-specific spatial statements on vacant lots in the Grand Center neighborhood.
About CityStudioSTL
CityStudioSTL supports a series of community engagement and outreach projects that bring together students in architecture, art, and design with partners in the city of St. Louis. It is generously supported by Gina and Bill Wischmeyer, BA69/MArch71.