The letter written by Pride-Wells was disrespectful. Sure, Niland is strong willed and will no doubt share his thoughts in the most blunt terms. But that is excatly why he is so effective as a teacher. I know many of you have reservations about Daniel Friedman, but as a previous SAID director, he found way to incorporate Niland's strong point of view to the school's advantage. It took them coming to blows physically but they found mutually beneficial ground and levels of mutual respect. As Vamosi wrote, it is yet another sign of administrative weakness that Pride-Wells cannot more effectively manage a strong and important figure such as Niland. I can only imagine some of things Niland has said in various meetings over the last couple of years, but he is very upset with the direction of the school. The best UC students will still make the drive out to Locust Corner Road for crits and the best critics and UC will invite Niland into the building everyday. All of this refelcts very poorly on Pride-Wells. Niland is difficult but the best teacher UC has had. Numerous directors have had to cotend with his strong personality and did so successfully. The letter cites differences amongst faculty perspectives on the future of architectural practice. I am not sure whom she is refering to (Postell? Saile?) but Niland's has made 40 years of thesis students better, more deliberate, more aware, and more skilled architects. It is extremely unfortunate and difficult for me to read about Niland being treated this way. I completely support Niland. I would also completely support an alumni letter in support of Niland. It is not apparent the Pride-Wells appreciates 40 years of teaching. A letter signed by 40 years of alumni might help.

anybody know what specific event(s) precipitated this action on the part of UCDAAP?

knowing and respecting michael pride-wells and having only met niland, this seems extreme, like there may be more to the story than we know.

Steven, I am just as confused. I've met Michaele Pride (I think she dropped the Wells) and she seemed like she could be really effective. And like I said, Niland could be a very polarizing figure. I was told that something might have occurred within the thesis year faculty members that led to this, but that's all I know.

Switters hits the nail on the head, though. I support Niland and feel like he contributed as much to my education as a professor could have. And you will always have infighting between faculty, to an extent, but I have to say that this is a pretty disappointing display.

actually, you are an alumna.

Really? Is that a male / female thing?

alumni being the collective group, isn't alumna plural, too, for one or more members of the alumni? i thought she'd be an alumnus.

alumna - singular fem.
alumnus - singular masc.

alumni - plural

ah, cool.

Sweet, I'm an alumna. I wish other alumni would weigh in on this. mdler needs to put his pants on first, I suppose.

Sadly, DubK, it seems the best teachers are usually treated with extreme disrespect in academia. It is more and more a political game, and the entire adjunct faculty system, whereby fresh meat is brought in to teach with no benefits, no support, slave wages, and only semester-to-semester job security is flat-out appalling. It goes entirely against the notion of bettering oneself through education. It sounds like your guy Niland is not "fresh meat", but if he is a teacher who puts educating students above all else than it is frankly unsurprising to hear that he is being treated shamefully by new administration.

I understand similar things are happening at UIC... Apparently Sidney Robinson (IMO, one of the best professors in the program) is leaving the school at the end of the year. I'm not sure what the back story is, but I get the impression that the administration is happy to see him leave. Such a shame.

who is running the UC thesis these days??

Stedman???

The current thesis faculty are Gordon Simmons, Jay Chatterjee, Tom Bible, Aarati Kanekar, Michael McInturf and Elizabeth Riorden. My sense is that the faculty were in almost universal agreement about the decision. Niland was coming in and criticizing the faculty saying that they didn't know how to teach. The letter states that the he was asked to leave in a meeting with Michaele, Jay and Gordon, the latter two being long time friends with him and obviously having no animosity toward him.

I really can't judge his abilities as a professor given that I haven't had any classes with him, but my understanding is that he was very against some of the changes in the curriculum that put more emphasis on collaboration, interdisciplinary design and social responsibility.

Where is Sidney headed?

sidney larson???

i dunno, is the letter that long? post the letter, this is interesting

Sidney Robinson @ UIC... No idea where he's headed. He's director and founder of the Institute for Architecture and the Humanities here in Chicago (no website, unfortunately), and he owns that cool Bruce Goff house in Aurora, so I'd assume he'll be staying local.

I don't know, I'm thinking that I won't post the letter, but if you want to see it, email me. I'm not trying to cause trouble, as I have a lot of affection for my school and respect for the people that run it, but I thought that this should be brought up for some discussion.

Like I said, Niland is a fairly difficult character to work with, but the situation seems to display a lack of "bi-partisanship", we'll call it. Perhaps he didn't support a lot of the changes that took place with the curriculum but let's face it, on the way out, neither did we. I felt that it was a slap in the face to design a 150,000 sf structure and walk away with a 6-year Bachelor's degree, only to find out that some of the students following us could get a Master's degree in 6 years without designing a building for their thesis. I still think it's preposterous to give someone a design degree if they haven't designed something. I think that Niland might agree....

WonderK,

we had to design a building...

I couid have sworn that some of your classmates only did a research project. I could be wrong.

i spent the year researching how much beer I could consume at Wednesday night bowling

i thought we only do lot extrusions.

Somebody told me about this post, and so I thought I would list my comments here and shed some light on this topic. First off, I was a student at the Unviversity of Cincinnati and I worked with David for a solid two years on my thesis project. He was not an adjunct, he was not employed by the university. He came in on his own time to teach, we met 4-5 times a week. It was the best experience I ever had with any professor, he never let me lose site of my goal, ornamentation, something David knows more about than anyone. I have been yelled at by David, and he has even hit me with his cane a few times, but every single time he did so I deserved it. WonderK, you are exactly right, you have to let David teach you architecture the way he knows architecture. Some people disagree with this, but it was an eye opening experience, while recently at the Yale open house I sat in on many studio critiques and realized that Peter Eisenmen teaches architecture the way he knows it, and so does Pasquerelli and anyone else worth a damn. You want to learn how to become a great architect you put your pride aside and ignore your ego and accept the fact that a person like David knows more about architecture than you do at this point and time, and it might not be the right color or flavor, but if you can trust him to teach you, you will learn.

David has become one of my best friends, and when Mary told me the news I was crushed. If David doesn't have the best interest of his student's in mind, then I don't know what my best interest are (refering to Pride's quote). I graduated in June and have met with him several times, to visit, and discuss my portfolio. David is helping me with my application to Yale right now, and he has pushed me to develop an amazing portfolio, not to sound conceited, but when I compare my portfolio before and after working with David for two years it is amazing how much I have grown as a designer.

Now to clear up some things, the 'letter' that everyone is talking about, has Gordon Simmon's name in it. After a lecture was given at UC by Peter Eisenman, a very reliable source that I will not name saw Gordon go up to David and appologize for the way he had been treated and that he had nothing to do with the 'letter' that is circulating around. More evidence for this is that David was assigned as my first chair, and then when I started meeting with him, Pride took him off of the thesis committee, I told Gordon that I knew that David was the best person for me to work with, and Gordon allowed me to work with David, even if the schedule that me and David kept interferred with UC scheduled classes related to thesis. There were many times that architectural discussions or outings caused me to miss lectures, some of which I was supposed to give to incomming thesis students.

Lastly, and I hope you are still reading David did not solicit students to meet with him, he didn't have to. He kept regular hours, his office was always open, Chatterjee invited him to weekly critiques, and he was always a favorite amongst students. I feel that if you don't get along with David it has to do with his intimidating personality, he knows more about architecture than any person I have been privalidged to talk to for more than a few minutes. For people who are insecure, he is a threat, for people who share the same passion as him, he can be a friend for life. I've jokingly told him that he would be the best man in my wedding, and he replies that he and Mary are finishing adoption papers. I just can't read the letter that was written about a person who so unselfishly gave everything he had to a school and is now being treated this way. David currently has an attourney and is working on presenting a case to the President of UC. If you would like to write a letter about your experience with David it would greatly be appreciated by him, if you would prefer not to commit the amount of time required to write such a letter, simply mail a letter saying that "The way David Niland was treated by the current administration is wrong." and sign the letter, that would be helpfull as well. Please scan and mail the letters to my e-mail address at:

james@studiojarch.com

and I will make sure he gets them, I know they will be appreciated.

That's a pretty powerful testimony. Thanks for weighing in, jamez.

no, i can intuit enough from the discussions...and by now it's like, i shouldn't even be reading the thread, it's not my school and i would have nothing to add except that firing someone by mass e-mail is a lawsuit and a decline in fundraising waiting to happen. tell your dean or director not to let that overpriced titanium screen door hit her on her way out.

wonderK-
why I think that some kind of response is warranted for the action which has occurred, I do not find archinect an appropriate medium for said remarks. I also do not think that a "call to arms", if you will, by a group of alumni operating as a knee jerk reaction is correct either. This was a signed, sealed and mailed letter which has been made into a PDF and sent on to many individuals for what is most likely a just cause however, more insight and investigation into the departure of a beloved faculty member should be found in order to have an appropriate response.

I figured that somebody would say something like that, which is why I didn't post the letter nor have I said anything about a "call to arms". Incidentally I was asked to bring it up here by a few people and I was fine with it, and I also think that this is a valid medium for doing so, since there is such a good variety of thoughtful opinions on this forum. I trust that *most* of my fellow alumni are reasonable enough to take the entire situation into account and respond in whatever way they feel fit. I am but a messenger, and I am not a babysitter...

i think that there is decent possibility that Niland did something that would provoke this letter. Whether or not he made a politically incorrect comment or something else who knows. He is a representation of a different era of architecture and hes proud of it. I am anxious to find out the real story before pointing fingers. This will no doubt affect the current review of Micheal Pride that is going on.

sounds like a job for garwondler...

WonderK, I did not accuse you of asking for a call to arms however, I have received emails entitled as such. His feelings (which you obviously share) in regards to the change of the pedagogy at SAID obviously are not in tune with the new direction. Change can be a difficult thing and even worse when it involves a great number of people and varying degrees of positions. The new M.Arch program is still in transformation and still improving to work out its kinks. My classmates that chose the M.Arch route worked very hard to earn their degrees, the format and objective in which they operated was much different than the B.Arch and, lacking clarity that many of them struggled with. However, the issue and/or notion of “design” as you have used it in a previous post is up for much debate however, I leave semantics for another time. The new direction is not a slap in the face to anyone and is consistent with other graduate curriculums of other institutions found in the US.

The action that has taken place stems from the Provost and lawyers and is rather unfortunate and of course angers others and myself. With that said, Niland was treated with the utmost respect with his official retirement in 2001 and even retained for four years after that – how can you let such a wealth of knowledge just walk out the door? He is not an easy person to deal with and was thoroughly against the new direction the school had decided to take and is taking – this is something he shared continuously and without filter. I personally feel that he should step down however; this comes from a personal opinion of concern for his health and not his ability as a professor. His lack of presence, knowledge and commitment to the current and future students will be missed in ways that many in the administration will never comprehend and this is obvious in their treatment of him at this current juncture. I think the people that will miss out the most are the people who are there now for their education. I feel lucky to have had the opportunity to share in his vast wisdom.

With that said, I still do not feel that archinect is the appropriate forum for this type of discussion. If you truly feel as strongly as you have indicated there are other parties that you can contact to vent – doing so here will lead to no resolution or closure of the subject matter or your feelings about it. Maybe it is time to turn your focus to the old man and show how much you have appreciated him instead feelings other than appreciation.

aeaa,

when did you become so articulate?

GARWONDLER won't sleep until justice has been served

aeaa, I find it somewhat ironic that you "do not feel that archinect is the appropriate forum for this type of discussion" yet you are still participating in it, instead of emailing me personally to discuss this issue. I guess we will agree to disagree.

As for my own personal response, I am still trying to balance all the various perspectives before I take any kind of action. It strikes me as an inability to "all play together in the same sandbox", so to speak.

Oh jesus. Garwondler and the DAAP scales of justice!

do I have to do everything around here...???

I may just have to print that out for next week . . .

I met with David Niland and Stephen Vamosi yesterday to get the story from their point of view.

Aside from the treatment that David was given, the shocking thing to confirm was that the present School Director has eliminated Senior Thesis in all but words and is allowing a simple one prof/one student independent study to suffice. I feel this is a "dumbing down" of the program, and UC Arch is unlikely to maintain its status and reputation under these circumstances, let alone the quality of its education.

David is 79, very frail and walks with a cane. The intellect is undiminished, but he is hardly a figure who is intimidating, and in fact I doubt he leaves his office much. He is afraid to go back to U.C. because of her threats even though the faculty has voted him emeritus status and he has an office. It is inconcievable he did anything of a level to provoke the threats in the letter except by his very presence- when he was in his office students flocked to him. This proved to be a visual reminder to the Director of her failed directions for senior year.

I feel like I owe him my best effort, he gave me his every chance he could 30 years ago.

I cannot decide what makes me feel worse, what she did to David or what she did to my college.

I felt the best approach was to go to the President directly and reason that since she wants to be known as raising UC's standards, she needs to take action. I sincerely think the old Architectural Thesis was a defining part of our education, and I sincerely think this present administration is dumbing down the program perhaps because of a lack of understanding. If you study national ratings you are quickly struck with the following facts: The University of Cincinnati is overall ranked as a "third tier" university, mediocre at best. DAAP is consistently ranked in the top 5 in the nation (with some programs like ID ranked in the top 5 in the world). Most of U.C.'s prestige comes from DAAP! Until I looked I had no idea.

Rumor is the School Director is being flooded with letters and emails. This is good, she really screwed up both with David and with Senior Thesis and she needs to acknowledge it and fix it.

I urge you to write to President Zimpher, on stationary if possible, and express your opinion. I feel the goals are to restore Senior Thesis as it was and to restore David's status and allow him back into his office without fear of being physically drug from the building.

I know its a pain to take time like this, but I think we are in danger of loosing the school's reputation if we do not act. I also think we have a good chance of fixing this if we express our disapproval.

first Huggins, now Niland...damn

Maclin, what in the world are you talking about? They have made no indication whatsoever about getting rid of thesis. In fact, it was under Michaele that they insisted on calling year 1 of the 2 year MArch "Research Year" and year 2 "Thesis Year". I'm in thesis right now, doing the same kind of thesis that's been done for the last-who-knows-how-long, and as far as I can tell, they have the same intentions for the next year. If they're de-emphasizing intense thesis research and design, then why did they get rid of the Disney trip and our total control over Bridge Break (both of which, I believe, were Gordon's idea)?

I spoke to Michaele about the issue yesterday and she said she'd received about eight e-mails. She insists that they offered David many options for how he could continue involvement in the school, but would accept none of them. He is, of course, fully welcome to come at the invitation of any student or faculty member.

And a side note on UC's prestige, yes, DAAP contributes a lot to that, but CCM does just as much if not more. Our musical theater program is pretty widely regarded as in the top two or three in the nation.

So if CCM carries the banner is Architecture expendable?

The thesis you are experiencing is a shadow of what it was. There was so much more.

All the man had was office hours, perhaps you would like to share with us these "options"?

I will confirm for you, archtopus, that the current thesis IS NOT what is was for the past few decades. it was a core strength of the school. from what i have seen over the past few years, epsecially during the transtion, is radically different in intent, ambition, rigor and results. it is now doubt up to current and future classes and faculty to change this, but lets not compare apples and oranges.

Well perhaps you'd share with me what you see as the precise differences between the past and current thesis then.

Well, this is interesting. I'll weigh in.....

I entered DAAP in '96 and graduated in '02....the senior projects I saw in the spring of my freshman year were, I have to say, stronger than many in my own classes'. There was more depth, more technical understanding, and more design complexity. It's hard to explain, I mean, I wished I had accomplished all that I wanted to but I fell short as well. I found it really strange at the time, because we put in the same amount of time and, it seemed like, the same amount of effort.

Also I think the disney trip was a Hallmark of the senior year. People who don't understand the methodology of Niland's teaching might think that self-guided study and intense research is more valuble to your education than taking a trip to Orlando. But the truth is, you don't stop learning at your 5th year. I saw more architecture - and crap - on that trip than I had seen in my whole education to that point. There's only so much about a space you can experience on a slide in an auditorium. I guess the question is, which method of teaching is more appropriate to the program? And is it affecting the overall quality of the degree obtained...

An even more pressing question, in my opinion, is why can't both methods coexist?

As the former traditions of the School of Architecture may not be familiar to you, I will explain. I think the most valuable thing Architecture has at U. C. is the Co-Op program.  I am sure I need not recount to you that U.C. has perfected this educational experience. For architectural students closely behind the Co-Op experience was the Senior Thesis.  Architecture Senior Thesis was an all encompassing experience, an immersion in the research, programming, design, and execution of a building. A student was exposed to a variety of professors, often including engineers and industry specialists, and a variety of approaches. One then was exposed to a variety of “critics”, who often were visiting professors or local practicing architects. This was as intense a learning experience as most would ever have.   One key thing students needed to take away was the ability to make decisions through such an overload of input while under pressure. That is precisely what the profession is like and why so many choose to teach. Senior Thesis was a practical thing, a thing meant to turn out doers as opposed to degree holders.  To my knowledge it was unique, a product of a school that took practice seriously and wanted to create architects who build.  That approach, which the Co-Op system is also a manifestation of, put U. C. Architecture consistently into the top 5 schools in the country over the last 30 years.

What the David Niland incident has revealed to myself and other alumni is that the present School Director has eliminated this Senior Thesis in favor of a more conventional approach which is not immersive and really should be called “independent study”. This approach fails to build on so many of the unique strengths that U. C. Architecture had, it fails to be a full immersion experience, it fails to expose the future architect to a variety of approaches, and it fails to force the student to deal with seemingly conflicting constraints. The “independent study” approach in fact is a considerable dumbing down of senior year. I would submit to you that a large part of U. C. Architecture’s top ranking came from this attitude and from this approach. Dumbing down the program is not going to help ranking. It is foolish to throw that away. I am very afraid that once Architecture at U. C. looses its ranking it will be incredibly difficult to get it back.

Ok, I'll admit to you that the school certainly does have a different approach now. But this is definitely an issue that has nothing to do with Michaele Pride. She's been here since fall quarter of 2003 and all of the changes you mention, and many many more that you don't, were well into development and implementation by the time she arrived.

If anything, it seems to me that they've flipped the program over, putting intense, immersive experiences toward the beginning and allowing breathing room for more diverse theoretical interests in the new MArch. The centerpieces of the current undergrad program (which is 4 years) are co-op (still, obviously), the second year studio and the fourth year studio.

The second year studio is actually called Immersion and has many of the qualities you describe the former Senior Thesis as having. My class was the first to go through Immersion. It essentially is one class that fills your schedule in which 6 professors teach all of the disciplines: structures, ET, history etc. A standard week in Immersion features about 18 hours of lecture in one of those subjects, 18 hours of studio time modifying your design based on what you just learned, and 6 hours of representation skills. You don't have time to take any other courses, and it's well, as I like to call it, DAAPtism by Immersion. It's a quarter that pushes and pulls you in every different direction, giving you a bit of each subject as you go along, so that as you go through the subsequent years, each idea is constantly in that back of your mind, making it a more integrated process. The quarter features a week-long trip through Pittsburgh, Fallingwater, Boston, New Haven and New York. As far as I can tell, the class was the brainchild of Jerry Larson, Daniel Friedman and Anton Harfmann.

The fourth year studio is similar to what I believe used to be call the 4th year Capstone, but is more often called SEC now, standing for Structures, Environmental Technology and Construction. It's a two quarter long studio that focuses on the more technical aspects of a building. It's mostly design through model and section, and requires very-detailed 1/2" models. My understanding is that they made the decision to pack the technical building knowledge into the 4th year studio in order to free up the Master's thesis for more theoretical research. In fact, students from less technical undergrads who do our 3-year MArch have to take SEC.

Many of these decisions were made because while they saw many of our graduates being very good builders and integrating with firms well, it was less common for them to become the idea leaders in the profession. The current thesis is preceded by all of the technical skills in previous years, plus a year of in-depth research into a topic of our choosing. The MArch as it is now forces our students to be more self-directed. Our success, or not, isn't based on whether a professor or some outside critic pushes us, it's about whether we can bring our own insights and research and passion to create a project more in-line with our future aspirations.

I think that we should invite Michaele and David to Archinect. Things just seem to make more sense here. And we can do it all without writing letters too.

Wait, I guess posts are kind of like letters.

I'm going to go work this out, you guys keep talking.

The present Bs/MArch program was forced upon UC by the fact that other schools like Miami and OSU were granting MArch’s for the same or less rigorous coursework than UC was requiring for a BArch. UC had no choice, in essence this was marketing.

But to be an architect one needs a professional degree. The State demands a minimum level of education. Once licensed, architects represent the State in matters of public safety, so states are unwilling to let universities do “whatever” and call someone an architect.

The undergraduate program has no sanction. By itself, the undergraduate degree is a curiosity, like a degree in English. It alone gets you nowhere but perhaps a drafting room with lower wages than someone with a professional degree, it does not earn you the right to sit for the licensing exam so your future is dead ended. This is horribly cruel to do to students, but marketing in our society rules all things.

Now some folks might have thought that UC students need more theory because they tend to be doers rather than academicians. I have heard that criticism, although there are far worse things than being a doer.

U.C. Arch was never meant to be all things to all people, it was meant to turn out architects. It was focused on that one thing and it did it very well. Once graduated one was free to go somewhere and get a more academic degree, like Princeton (Michael Graves) or the University of Pennsylvania (Dennis Mann), or so many others.

If you really want a good grounding in theory even now you still need to do that, an MArch from UC has no credibility in that arena. And discarding the final immersive thesis is bogus as well, so you end up with neither the excellence in practical education not the excellence in theory.

A better way to have looked at the present program would have been that it essentially could be the same as it was, 6 years to a professional degree. The intense 4th year program is great, but the immersive 6th year thesis is still valid as well.

As to whether the present director was responsible for this, I am sure she was not. But she is the one who is presently presiding over the wrong turn. What brings this all back to her door is she is the one who is taking extraordinary retribution on anyone who disagrees when she should be looking at making it work. She is profoundly wrong to have done this and she should correct it as soon as possible by rescinding her threats and apologizing. I think she has not really understood what Niland has been telling her, and it is obvious she does not understand what Architecture at UC was all about for the past 50 years (or how it came to be rated so highly). She could have a very positive effect if she tried to improve instead of defending the status quo just because she can.

David’s best bet would have been to take the retirement money and leave and never look back. He is cursed with too much integrity to do that, and chose to have office hours as an emeritus professor where students were free to come and discuss design with him. In fact that is precisely what universities hope emeritus professors do, continue to contribute where they can. He did this for students, because at heart he cannot abandon them. As to theory, that is in fact mostly what David teaches.

wow, reading these entries from Maclin and archtopus is so telling. It's the old and the new coming together in a forum!

The actual letter was posted because of the flippant, hypocritical, skeptical, and cynical assertions posted above by WonderK and her subsequent cast of respondants, including archtopus. It is quite clear from their statements that they only have a superficial understanding of what Niland is about, what he stood for, and what he in fact advocated, and how it has been routinely misrepresented due to professional jealousy. You are nothing more than apologists for the current administration.

Archtopus's disrespectful and arrogant responses to jamez and Maclin does not correlate with what it takes to be an AIAS president. It is no surprise to me that Mr. Davis has the full political endorsement from Ms. Pride, which he should have revealed while making his arguments in her defense.