On April 4th Banwell hosted four charismatic eighth grade students for the Upper Valley’s annual Job Shadow Day. This was the fifth time Banwell has participated in this event, and every year we look forward to doing it again next year.
This year we had two students from Lebanon Middle School and two students from Indian River School. They were a bit nervous stepping foot into the office as their first day as an architect but it didn’t take long for them to feel comfortable and settle in. Finding the candy jar so early in the morning may have helped.
The day started out with a tour of the office and a quick overview of life as an architect: how to prepare for college, life at college as an architectural student, your first couple of years as an architectural intern, to studying for and ultimately taking the Architectural Registration Exams to become an actual real-life architect!
Next they were assigned a mini-project that would give them a very brief overview of what a typical project may look like from start to finish. First they met their client, Batman, who wanted a new house located somewhere along the shore of Mascoma Lake. The students had to pick which location of the lake they wanted to situate the house. We discussed daylighting, geographical features, and even thought about private locations so that Batman could come and go via his Bat-boat without being seen. Once a location was chosen (an excellent location if I might add) the students reviewed the program of the house (spaces & the respective square footage) and using architectural scales drew and cut out rooms to scale that they used to layout the floorplan of the house. After much debate the layout was finally complete, and to finalize the design they finished by adding landscaping around the perimeter of the house.
The last step of the process was to present their design to the rest of the architects at Banwell Architects. In the past this has been the more difficult piece of the day because it can be quite nerve racking to stand up in front of a group of people (who you do not even know!) and confidently and coherently discuss your design and explain “why” you did this and that. But these four kids “crushed” it, as the kids say these days. Not only were they convincing of “why” they did certain things, but they did a phenomenal job presenting. There were no “ums”, “likes”, or “ahs”. No long delays in thought processes or looking around for help. No faltering under tough questions from the audience. They had ten minutes to present and they filled that entire ten minutes with meaningful discussion. I think Batman would have been very impressed!
Per usual, the students this year were fantastic. So much more mature and goal oriented than I was at that age. You never know at the beginning of the day if the students are actually interested in architecture, or the free pizza they will get at lunch. But in the end they are always there for the experience. Even though they were two different groups of teenagers who had never met, they demonstrated impeccable teamwork, understanding and compromise when working together on the design charrette. All four of them will make great architects someday. We wish you the best of luck!
