Intervention Reflective Report

Introduction 

This report is a reflection on the top-down structural changes implemented by CSM BA Architecture in the year of 2024-25, and how these changes impacted my teaching practice and student engagement this academic year. This is important because those changes came to stay, and because there was a significant decline in student engagement. While the changes introduced are beyond my control, I propose to focus on understanding the impact within my space of sovereignty, the studio space, and propose an intervention that can foster a more inclusive approach.

Positionally x Inclusion

I am an architect, urban designer and researcher, interested in how urbanisation reproduces socio-spatial inequalities, and in the role of design and collaborative thinking as tools for tangible and transformative actions. As a white, middle-class, professional and non-disabled women, who grew up in São Paulo (Brazil), one of the biggest, most unequal and violent cities in the world, I am conscious that the way I negotiate the city is always in relation to my identity, entitlements, my past and present experiences (Lynch, 1956), and in some ways, my imagined futures.

For someone who studies urban transformation and understands cities as relational ecosystems, the limits of my own lived experience are too narrow, and that is why collaborations and teaching have become crucial elements of my research and practice. For me, teaching is a platform to practice collaborative design thinking, connect research, education and society, and learn with and from my diverse student groups, who are city users and bearers of knowledge.

In my teaching practice, diversification cannot become a box ticking exercise because diversification and inclusion are fundamental, not only to avoid epistemic injustices and loss of valuable knowledge (Rekis 2023), but to foster a pedagogical space for authentic learning (Barnett 2007), where oneself can be changed by ideas and (Hooks 1994, Barnett 2007), and architectural education can, in alignment with the as the Manifesto for Spatial Practices at Central Saint Martins (CSM), make connections to social processes, generate knowledge and value, and make a wider contribution to society.

Context

At CSM, BA Architecture students choose to enrol in one of 10 different vertical studios for their design module. Each studio (around 20 students) is co-run by a pair of tutors who have full autonomy to propose the design brief, study area and methodology under and within the overarching course structure.

The course used to be divided in three terms focused on Research & Enquire (term 1), Design Development and Experimentation (term 2), and Project Resolution (term 3), with one summative submission in the end of the year. The Block System implemented in 2024-25 introduced the following structural changes:

• Design course is divided in 2 blocks: Block 1 – 40 credits, and Block 2 – 20credits
• A new summative assessment in the end of Block 1 (two-thirds of the year).
• Academic year reduced by 4 teaching weeks

Impact:

Analysing the data for my studio this academic year (2024-25) I confirmed some of my initial observations (intervention plan):

• Overall attendance was 80% in Block 1 and 65% in Block 2 (drop of 15%)
• There is a clear breaking point, when students stop attending the studio sessions, immediately after the Block 1 review – formative submission.
• Disengagement was slightest more evident among second-year students.
• Chinese second-year students were disproportionally affected:  3 out of 3 students stopped attending studio sessions after Block 1 review.

^{Figure 1 – Attendance record – academic year 2024-25 – Block system}

Data analysis from the previous academic year (2023-24) shows that:

_.

^{Figure 2 – Attendance record – academic year 2023-24}

The fact that disengagement is more evident among second-year students suggests to me that there is an inclusion issue which contributes to second-year students feeling less supported and more alienated from the design sessions during the design phases. The beginning of the design development stage is the point when:

• We move from group work (research) to individual work (design).
• We move from group presentations to individual tutorials.
• Studio sessions become less structured.
• We provide less teaching and more independent study and production time.

Under the new block system, unsupported or untutored time was massively amplyfied as:

• The 4 teaching weeks reduced from curriculum were replaced by independent production time.
• Students who failed Block 1 had to manage the resit submissions independently and alongside their Block 2 work.
• Student who want to improve their Block 1 marks had to managed the work for their optional resubmission independently and alongside their Block 2 work.

Intervention Rationale

Although I cannot change the conditions imposed by the new Block System, I would like to address this gap of engagement affecting my students, and more specifically second-year students, which I can see was amplified by the new reality.

I work hard to build a safe collaborative space and a sense of community during the initial Research & Enquire phase to avoid the loss of valuable knowledge (Rekis 2023). I provide highly structured activities designed to create opportunities to learn from the wealth and diverse experiences of others, to foster empathy (Hooks 1994) so that students can develop a sensibility to the study site and city users, and develop a clear position in relation to the social-spatial conditions they engage with. These activities include, for example: site visits, engagement with external partners, group work and presentations, collective discussions and drawing workshops.

The success of this approach is reflected on the level of student engagement and quality of the research they produce collectively. When revisiting my second-year Chinese students’ portfolios for example, the ones who completely disengaged from the design sessions this year, I was please to find the evidence of their learning in the research phase. It is a shame to see that momentum losing up when, in the ‘design development’ phase, students are asked to work individually and more independently.

While third-year students in previous years seem to perform better under these more individualistic practices (Garrett 2024) which are part of architecture education, it is clear to me that the block system posed a bigger challenge and all students, including second- and third-years, found the lack of structured opportunities for peer-to-peer learning challenging and discouraging (see figure 1).

Intervention Aims and Structure

The idea is to promote a more inclusive and participatory approach during the design stages and capitalise on the momentum built in the in the Research & Enquire phase, by taking students out of their individual design work at a specific time of the day, and bring them together for a group presentation and discussion.

Proposed Studio Day

• 10:30 – 15:30: individual or group tutorials.
• 15:30 – 17:00: presentations and discussion.

The presentations would be assigned around pre-established themes including: architectural projects, design practices, spatial experiences, drawing and model making techniques, and technical aspects, and would consist of brief student led presentations, where a small group of students share references and inspirations, followed by a group discussion facilitated by the tutors.

In this way, we could collectively build a studio vocabulary (references) as diverse and rich as our student cohort (Richards & Finnigan 2015), encourage students to attend the studio sessions by providing the structured space for exchanges and peer-to-peer learning, while removing potential anxiety or shame around presentations by focusing the analysis and discussion on the work of others (precedent studies). Additionally, this would provide a space for students to practice their presentations and analytical skills routinely in a “low stake” environment (Russel 2010).

Evaluation

I would expect this intervention to work as a “small learning” method that allows students to construct a foundation – vocabulary of projects and practices – from where individual knowledge and design ideas can grow from (Shen & Sanders 2023).

If successfully implemented in the next academic year, I expect to see a reduction in the disengagement affecting students across the design phases, and consequently, an improvement in the overall attendance after the formative submissions and Block 2.

I also expect that the shared resources and inspirations would foster more design experimentation during the design development phase and support a more confident sense of self-authenticity (Shen and Sanders 2023) to all students, resulting in a richer design process that better responds to the socio-spatial complexities of their urban sites and research.

Conclusion 

As an educator who believes that learning should be authentic, enabling and transformational (Barnett 2007, Hooks 1994), I am aware that my learning as a teacher is a fundamental element for the effective learning of my students (Ashwin, Boud, et al 2015). And, it is when students bring their findings, perspectives and inspirations to the studio space that my learning as a teacher happens, that is what fuels me to continue to teach year after year.

In that sense, the intervention proposed is designed not only to allow students to act and interact in a different and more collaborative way during their design development work, but to foster theirs and my creativity. And, the success of this strategy relies in part in students perceiving my authentic excitement and fulfilment as a teacher during these sessions.

Here is where both the success and failure of this intervention can get realised. With student engagement and exchange, there is learning, creativity and teacher’s fulfilment. Without student engagement there is no learning, creativity or teacher’s fulfilment, and consequently, no student engagement. 

References:

Ashwin, P, Boud, D, Coate, KL, Hallett, F, Keane, E, Krause, K-L, Leibowitz, B, MacLaren, I, McArthur, J, McCune, V & Tooher (2015). Reflective Teaching in Higher Education. [online] Reflective Teaching, Bloomsbury Academic. Available at: <http://reflectiveteaching.co.uk/books-and-resources/reflective-teaching-in-higher-education> [Accessed 14 jul 2025]

Barnett, R. (2007) A will to learn: Being a Student in an Age of Uncertainty. Maidenhead: Open University Press.

CSM. A manifesto for spatial practices at Central Saint Martins. [Online] Available at: https://www.arts.ac.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0014/190112/Spatial-Practices_Manifesto.pdf [Accessed 14 jul 2025]

Garrett, R. (2024). Racism shapes careers: career trajectories and imagined futures of racialised minority PhDs in UK higher education. Globalisation, Societies and Education, pp.1–15.

Hooks, B. (1994). Teaching to Transgress. Educations as the Practice of Freedom. New York: Routledge.

Lynch, K. and Lukashok, A. (1956). Some Childhood Memories of the City. In City Sense and City Design: Writings and projects of Kevin Lynch (1995) 4th ed., 2002. Massachusetts – London: The MIT Press Cambridge.

Richards, A. and Finnigan, T. (2015) ‘Embedding equality and diversity in the curriculum: An art and design practitioner’s guide.’ York: Higher Education Academy. Available at: https://www.advance-he.ac.uk/knowledge-hub/retention-and-attainment-disciplines-art-and-design [Accessed 14 jul 2025]

Russell, M. (2010) University of Hertfordshire Assessment Patterns: A Review of the Possible Consequences. [online] Available
at: < https://blogs.kcl.ac.uk/aflkings/files/2019/08/ESCAPE-AssessmentPatterns-ProgrammeView.pdf> [Accessed 17 Mar 2025]

Shen, Y. and Sanders, E. (2023) Identity discovery: Small learning interventions as catalysts for change in design education. [online] Journal of design, business & society, Volume 9 number . Available at: < https://doi.org/10.1386/dbs_00049_1> [Accessed 14 jul 2025]

Rekis, J. (2023) Religious Identity and Epistemic Injustice: An Intersectional Account [online] Hypatia, Cambridge University Press. Available at: https://doi:10.1017/hyp.2023.86 [Accessed 14 jul 2025]