ABSTRACT
Karl Linn University of Pennsylvania and University of California, Berkley in the 1960s–1970s and John Collin, Temple University in the 1980s–1990s were pioneers in design-build teaching. The number of landscape architecture design-build programs is modest as compared to those offered in architecture though the numbers are increasing. Limitations include availability of qualified professors, concerns about liability and risk, perceptions that design-build is “trade school oriented” and concerns about time and resource allocations. Advantages include advancing and integrating students’ knowledge, skills, creativity and resilience to both prepare them for professional practice and to bring to their work an ethic of social justice and equity. As a pedagogical model, the design-build approach integrates student learning with technology, community service and professional practice.
As universities recognize experiential learning as a form of applied research, practitioners of alternative teaching like design-build will have an opportunity to demonstrate the effectiveness of their models and learning outcomes. They can measure their contributions to both community development and health, as well as to innovation in the use of materials and sustainable technologies. Universities gain positive public relations through the service-learning model. As awareness of the design-build program expands, it attracts more students to the university, increasing enrollment.
