4B - Thursday, March 24, 2011
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
4B -Thusda, Mrch24,201 Th Miciga Daly mihigndalycm
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What do you think about architecture on campus?
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Quotes collected by Daniel Carlin; photos by Alden Reiss
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OMAN in the Architecture program
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Page 1B titled "Cultivating the Enormous:
Agritainment-Infratecture within
just have to be sort of cre- a new fishing paradigm," begins
d tenacious," he said. with studying the $7 billion fish-
words were said, but Stur- ing industry of the Great Lakes
d his peers must experi- and operates architecturally to
e word "tenacious" in an propose a carp processing distri-
more rigorous and less bution center and vessel.
manner than Mr. Jack These mindful connections
his musical pursuits. are so far away from being inside
the box that the students need a
What is too far? release from the intensity. Stur-
geon said when he's working too
eon spoke to the wild hard and becomes a "crazy her-
hat architecture is reach- mit," it helps to "bring it back to
te. the dinner table." In translation:
ink now we're in a place Behaving within normal daily
verything's on the table," life - outside of the architectural
. "We could be talking bubble - assists in maintaining a
uit flies, and it's architec- clear mind for the fortitude of an
untamed idea.
isitely dizzying ideas seem Sturgeon's standard of sanity
rialize out of the senior is measured by calling his mom
hat the graduate students when things appear to be getting
too crazy.
"I like the test where if I can
talk to my mom about it, it kind of
makes sense, it's valuable or some-
thing," he said.
Accelerating this notion for-
ward, he debated with himself the
validity of discussing architecture
instead of performing the prac-
tice, concluding that it is possible
to be "too theoretical" in the aca-
demic setting.
Floating down to reallife
So the architecture students
are taking 20-minute power
naps beside their best friend, the
laser cutter, and leaving the gym
behind, but for what result?
It seems that the students
have a variety of aspirations and
McMorrough is confident that
their education at the University
will support eclectic desires and
decisions.
"For the Bachelor of Science,
of course I think people join the
degree thinking they want to
be architects, but a lot of people
don't go on to be architects," he
said. "Not because they couldn't,
but because they discover other
things ... people have gone and
become filmmakers or painters or
lawyers or all sorts of things."
He is sure architectural edu-
cation is more about theory than
practice. The great reality about
that belief is that this unique way
of problem solving can translate
into a lot of different careers - it's
why the Architecture program
tries to describe the undergradu-
ate degree as liberal arts.
Though undergraduates are
afforded a more diverse future,
those who go to graduate school
and receive a Masters most likely
want to build - that is the expec-
tation.
The undergraduate students
can walk down varied avenues.
Junior Hannah Hunt Moeller
tends toward the humanitarian-
oriented direction. Alongside her
peers, Moeller started a group
called design FOR//HUMANS at
the University, using her skills to
help developing countries. The
group submitted two designs for
a playground competition for
Burmese refugee kids in Mae Sot,
Thailand. According to Moeller,
their small student-run organi-
zation serves as a think tank for
community design projects cen-
tered around human needs. It fits
what Moeller believes architects
see themselves as - "activists"
and "change-makers."
And in this light, the students in
the University's Architecture pro-
gram go beyond the making and
start to make change.
*I
sALAMRIDA/Daily
Undergraduate architecture students must do a Wallenberg Studio to graduate.
This event is free and open to the public. Originally commissioned by the
W.K. Kellogg Foundation, this dynamic,
Pre-registration is required. multi-faceted show highlights the LUCAS
www.SarahJenesEventRegistratien.org multicultural and class dimensions From Page 3B
of our national health care crisis.
"What beauty weighs" is the
Supportfor the Sarah Jones A Right to Care " A Right to Care has garnered impossible question that poets,
performance has been provided by the King- critical acclaim from around the and all the rest of us too, try
Chavbz-Parks Visiting Professors Program country and the world, and has to answer as we watch spring
and the U-M Office oftthe Senior Vice Provost. become itself.
sold-out Off-Broadway and at It's that cold spring between-
the Kennedy Center. season in which Derek Walcott, a
native of the Caribbean island of
St. Lucia, sets his poem "Upstate:"
"A knife blade of cold air keeps
*sevn** *eene *r* Ha*h prying/the bus window open.
Program*HealthThe spring country /won't be
shut out." The cold climate not-
withstanding, Walcott experi-
ences a kind of thaw, finds himself
... falling in love with America.
I must put the cold small peb-
bles from the spring
upon my tongue to learn her
language,
to talk like birch or aspen con-
fidently.
In Walcott's vision, "spring
country" is not only the land-
scape he passes, but America
itself, which represents a way of
falling in love, a feeling "as warm
as bread or as a homecoming."
The phrase "new beginning"
should be an oxymoron: Begin-
nings are supposed to happen
only once. But, in the words of
Walt Whitman, spring allows
poets to see the world "as Adam,
early in the morning." Poetry
finds words to describe what
happens when the miracle of
birth meets the mercy of return.
In "The Continuous Life," Mark
Strand writes, "the luckiest /
Thing is having been born." He
may well be right - but being
reborn is pretty good too.
Lucas is jumping for joy and
springing for spring. To join,*
e-mail dwlucas@umich.edu.