by William Prelogar Jr., AIA
I have noticed a trend over my 30 or 40 years in the profession that the time from graduation to licensure is getting longer. My perception is that the young graduates simply are not putting the same personal emphasis on getting licensed as we did in the past. We had the same three-year waiting period (during which we were professionally referred to as “draftsmen”) and a rigorous seven- part, four contiguous day exam process. This exam was administered by most states only once or twice a year. and you had to pass four of the seven parts to obtain and retain credit for passing any part.
Past the history and on to the observations:
- The tendency of the organization of practices within the profession to become larger has lessened the urgency felt by young professionals to become licensed so they can leave their internships and strike out on their own.
- The tendency of those now larger practices to recognize increasing competency by granting greater responsibility and commensurate pay increases based on performance rather than achieving an individual milestone such as licensure.
- The institution of the IDP program’s rather rigid training and experience regimen has, for many young graduates, lengthened the internship period.
- The introduction of the “take any part at any time” format for the professional examination has allowed a degree of procrastination to creep into the personal initiative of the interns.
- Societal changes in the length of time that young people take to find and settle on a mate and commence family (and therefore more responsible) life has greatly extended the “let’s party” lifestyle we all enjoyed in college. After all, who wants to wake up Saturday morning after a fun Friday night, dig out those ALS Seminars and “hit the books”?
- The profession has a dickens of a time already trying to get the lay public to understand what the title “Architect” means and stands for. Just look at the periodic newsletters from state licensing boards. The ones I receive are generally full of disciplinary actions taken against unlicensed professionals calling themselves “Architects.” What we clearly don’t need is another fuzzy title floating around out there to further confuse the public.
Now for some suggestions:
- All states should, through the NCARB, determine which sections of the exam are designed to test the mastery of primarily “academic” knowledge and which parts are designed to test knowledge gained through the internship experience. Once determined, those academic parts should be eligible for examination at any time after graduation.
- The IDP program could and maybe should be loosened up a bit as far as the precise number of units required in each experience category.
- The professional organizations (AIA) should really encourage its member firms to adopt and embrace IDP. As far as I’m concerned, the AIA is really weak here.
- Member firms should be encouraged to reward and recognize achievement of professional status by their young interns.
- The academic institutions should make sure that their curriculums include a clear and concise outline of the steps that new graduates will be expected to take to complete their preparation for achieving “professional” status.
- The interns themselves need to be more proactive in pursuing their licenses. When seeking a job make sure the firm you are going to work for has an active and useful IDP training program in place and agrees to provide you with timely and relevant experience and is prepared to mentor you through the process. If that firm is not willing to make that commitment, look elsewhere. Take responsibility for determining what your state board requires of you prior to your sitting for parts of the ARE, set timetables and deadlines for achieving your goals, and do not let procrastination interfere with your established priorities.
- Firms should accept responsibility for encouraging their interns to set personal goals, enroll in the IDP program, have regular review sessions to make sure the intern is getting the relevant experience, provide information about exam review sessions sponsored by the local AIA chapter, and be generous to this next generation of young architects. Provide paid time off for taking the exam. Pay the enrollment costs. (This, by the way, in most jurisdictions amounts to big bucks.) Pony up for a set of the ALS Seminars.
Instead of diluting what “architect” stands for, let’s proactively, as a profession, figure out how to make the time of internship more meaningful, the process more lucid, and achieving the status “architect” more compelling and rewarding.
Comments (28)
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Posted by Kip Fox | November 12, 2008 6:08 PM
Posted on November 12, 2008 18:08
I took my exams before they were given by computer and I drew the design solution. I worked very hard for the title Architect. I do not think the term "intern" was a bad thing to be then or a bad thing to be now. I am educated as an Engineer, Architect, Project Manager and MBA, on the job and/or at the university, so the 6 year masters degree in architecture is just a starting point in my mind and somewhat pointless without experience to match.
I worked hard to get the education and the license. We no longer live in a world where making money in architecture is easy, or where individuals having achieved all the credentials they need can actually start a business and practice of their own without also having the matching financial resources. The banks lend to those who have financial resource and do not lend on human potential arising from academic achievement or experience. That is true for Doctors as well as Attorney's.
If you think business start-up can be done without financial resource your wrong. As an architectural employee it is unlikely you can ever save the money to start a practice. The practice of throwing the old guy with a license out to fend for himself to make room for the up and coming is now just simply wrong and stupid.
For some reason, individuals without the license can start a business as "designers" in most states with only some limitation on building type or size or both. That was ok but in today's world that should stop because built environment now needs to be designed by the most qualified instead of the unqualified. Those of us trying to start a practice and those trying to keep their practice solvent and working must compete for projects against the unlicensed, unexamined and unqualified in addition to fellow architects. Built environment quality is shortchanged by the resulting bad design.
Getting a license has therefore, only limited potential for better income, for the intern who is working as an employee or to become a future licensed practicioner. That is unfair to interns, architects and the public.
Professional and societal influences have shifted but the mandate for better design quality arises from economics and physical reality. The idea of licensing is all about protecting the public and having better design quality. Every building inhabited should be designed by an architect with a license and that includes even single family homes built on speculation. No exceptions. Every Architect should have an IDP internship before taking the exam. We simply need better experienced architects. The license should be granted only to those actually qualified by exam and work experience. Only the qualified and licensed should be designing the cities of the future because of the challenges we face in the furure.
The world is choking on bad buildings. Houses built in areas where design criteria for 150 MPH winds has been code for 30 years should not be blown down completely or destroyed by wind in large numbers as happened in 2005. Bad design is too expensive.
Design quality is essential as we confront the advancing realities of global warming. Given the huge challenges in front of us, we need tighter standards of licensing, we need a licensed architect on every building constructed in the US and a profession that is competing on a quality basis and not a price basis. The last thing we want is to lower the bar on licensing.
TLW
Posted by Terry L. Walker, AIA | January 26, 2007 4:15 PM
Posted on January 26, 2007 16:15
I haven't been up to much these days. Today was a loss. Nothing seems important. I've just been letting everything happen without me these days.
Posted by Sten82590 | January 19, 2007 5:50 PM
Posted on January 19, 2007 17:50
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Posted by Anonymous | January 19, 2007 5:21 PM
Posted on January 19, 2007 17:21
the current structure of most firms, with one or two people sealing all project documents, lessens the need, desire and importance to get one's license, unless a desire to go out on one's own or eventually move into a position of authority exists. The sad fact is that i see many people who are content working in the trenches for 40 years, never dreaming of bothering to get licensed.
Posted by skeets | January 19, 2007 5:19 PM
Posted on January 19, 2007 17:19
One of the things that should be seriously looked at is the redundancy of having parts of the licensure exams test on academics. If a person has already graduated from an accredited university's School of Architecture with a degree in Architecture, this is needless testing for what they have already proven that they have learned.
Also, the AIA should be pushing the design schools to teach more of the real world parts of Architecture instead of expecting the firms (usually with tight budgets) to take up the slack through the intern program. This as opposed to spending countless hours in design school studying abstract thinking and talking about it. One of the things I have said to people in the past on a number of occasions is that design school teaches us to say yes or no in at least a long noncommittal paragraph.
Posted by Bill Petty | January 19, 2007 1:39 PM
Posted on January 19, 2007 13:39
I feel like a complete blank, but I don't care. Pfft. I've pretty much been doing nothing worth mentioning.
Posted by Sten73598 | January 17, 2007 6:26 PM
Posted on January 17, 2007 18:26
I've just been hanging out not getting anything done. What can I say? I've basically been doing nothing worth mentioning, but pfft. Not that it matters. Pretty much nothing exciting happening to speak of. I haven't been up to much these days.
Posted by Sten46963 | January 15, 2007 8:28 AM
Posted on January 15, 2007 08:28
My life's been basically bland today. More or less nothing seems worth thinking about. My mind is like an empty room. I've more or less been doing nothing to speak of. Not much on my mind recently.
Posted by Sten61165 | January 12, 2007 7:43 PM
Posted on January 12, 2007 19:43
Firms don't want interns to be licensed or else they would pay for it.
Posted by David | January 10, 2007 5:36 PM
Posted on January 10, 2007 17:36
One thing that hasn't changed over the last 30-40 years is the tendency for practitioners to think that it is somehow easier to criticize the process and to work to change it, than it is to simply go through the process and be done with it. I assure you that it is not, and I appreciate that the author above was an active reader of ArchVoices, which I co-founded. Part of the problem is precisely how much easier it is to keep your head down, complete a mediocre process not worthy of our innovative profession, and then get on with your life. Complaints about the internship process are not the result of kids looking for instant gratification, but rather of kids not willing to turn away from long-standing problems with fundamental aspects of our profession that are widely acknowledged by those without some personal or political stake in the existing system. Mr. Prelogar is correct in his overall solution: make internship meaningful. And it is only for the lack of progress on such reforms that this debate about titling has relevance and traction within the profession itself.
Posted by Casius Pealer | December 15, 2006 3:10 PM
Posted on December 15, 2006 15:10
I have been licensed for around 4 years now. After nearly ten years of “internship” time it really became so unimportant to me that I don’t even recall when it finally happened. I think Barry is completely correct in stating that the term intern has very negative connotations attached to it these days, and it felt like an insult having to use that term for years. Nearly none of what William described above applies to my scenario. I took a different career path having worked as a construction superintendent for the first few years upon graduation, and then in a design-build firm (not owned by a registered architect). I would never trade that experience away today, but to have years of architecture experience and years of construction experience and be required to refer to myself as an intern when marketing medium scale projects is – to be blunt – bs. There should be no reason a graduate from a five year architecture program can not be called an architect. Distinguishing between registered and unregistered is critical, but in my opinion forcing the term “intern” on young professionals is belittling.
Posted by terry amundson | December 15, 2006 2:25 PM
Posted on December 15, 2006 14:25
I believe that William Preloger hit it right on the head. Interns wanting to use the title "Architect" before they have earned the right is an example of "instant gratification" that seems to be endemic in new graduates.
Barry's perception that the term 'intern' is no longer respected is I believe not true. On the other hand, impatience is not a trait that is respected in our profession.
"I want it now. I deserve it now." is just not an attitude that should be encouraged.
If you want to be an architect, earn the right. It is not granted to you by the divine right of Kings.
Posted by Gary Bley | December 15, 2006 12:21 PM
Posted on December 15, 2006 12:21
Thank you for recognizing that the profession and societal influences have shifted over the past 30-40 years. This should not come as a surprise considering a draftsperson no longer uses pen and ink and our nation has sent men to the moon! Each time this topic comes into discussion, the licensed architects put up a defense to guard their hard earned and hallowed term: Architect - with a capital 'A'. This is to be expected and respected, they have earned it. Those of us that are yet to be licensed are not asking or expecting to be brought to this level without earning it. This seems to be a misconception. What we are asking for is a level of respect above the public’s perception of 'intern'. Just as draftspeople no longer use pen and ink, an 'intern' is no longer a respected position. Colloquially speaking, 'interns' are now college students making fools of themselves on morning radio shows for no pay or, even worse, some variation of Monica Lewinsky. After working 6 years to attain my post-graduate degree I know that I am above any of these perceptions and expect my profession to recognize this.
Posted by Barry | December 15, 2006 12:07 PM
Posted on December 15, 2006 12:07