CURRENT STATUS AND SPECIAL FUNCTIONS

Facilities

The IDI is housed in a new 38,000 square-foot educational facility located at the Spokane Higher Education Park at Riverpoint along the banks of the Spokane River, just east of downtown. The facility includes a computer-aided design laboratory, a design product room, a material resource room, a photographic laboratory, a geographical information systems and simulation laboratory, multi-media work areas, classrooms, seminar rooms, and faculty offices. Expansive studios generously equipped with computers simulate the professional work environments where design professionals and builders collaborate. They are designed specifically to enrich and celebrate disciplinary and interdisciplinary learning experiences.

Undergraduate Programs

The participating programs at the IDI are Architecture, Construction Management, Interior Design, and Landscape Architecture. The School of Architecture at Washington State University currently grants the four-year Bachelor of Science in Architecture, a five-year Bachelor of Architecture, and a five-year Bachelor of Construction Management. The Department of Apparel, Merchandising, and Interior Design offers the only four-year accredited program in the State of Washington. The Department of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture offers a five-year Bachelor of Landscape Architecture degree. Each of the programs in the IDI are fully accredited by NAAB, FIDER, ACCE, and ASLA, and are recognized internationally for excellence in the preparation of future professionals.

Graduate Programs

Beginning in the fall of 1998, graduate degree programs in architecture (M.S. Architecture), interior design (M.A. Interior Design), and landscape architecture (M.S. Landscape Architecture) will be offered at the IDI. The M.S. Architecture and M.A. Interior Design are existing programs based in Pullman that are extended to WSU Spokane. The M.S. Landscape Architecture is a new degree program offered at both WSU Spokane and WSU Pullman.

Each of the programs prepares students for advanced specialization in a specific area of inquiry while developing research skills. Even though the Higher Education Coordinating Board (HECB) only approved the programs in July 1998, interest has exceeded expectations. Approximately 15 full-time graduate students are expected to enroll in August 1998, almost tripling the anticipated enrollment for the first year.

Geographical Information Systems and Simulation Lab (GISS)

The IDI houses a Geographic Information Systems and Simulation Laboratory. Established in 1996, the lab is an instructional, research, and service resource for the Northwest that integrates geographic information system (GIS) and simulation technologies to examine spatial characteristics and problems in the built and natural landscapes, and to model the visual effects of landscape modification. The lab is equipped with state-of-the art equipment including 12 Windows workstations, printers, scanners, digitizers, a variety of GIS and simulation software. A full-time GIS and Systems Specialist manages the lab. The lab recently submitted an application (approval is pending) to become an authorized learning center for Environmental System Research Institute (ESRI) GIS software (Arc Info and Arc View products). The lab is also in the process of becoming an ER Mapper software training site.

The lab currently serves as an instructional resource for teaching entry level GIS courses to approximately 35 students in 1998. Entry-level, intermediate, advanced, and specialized academic courses in GIS will be offered in the lab by the 1999/00 academic year serving approximately 70 students. The lab is currently forging partnerships with public and non-profit agencies such as the United States Geological Service (USGS) to provide training and technical assistance in designing, planning, and managing built and natural-rural landscapes. The long-term goal is to transform the lab into a center of excellence in the Northwest for instruction, research, and service for the Inland Northwest, specifically for the planning program of Eastern Washington University.

Design Assistance and Public Education Program

The IDI provides design assistance and outreach services to communities in the Inland Northwest to help improve their quality of life. The focus of the design assistance program is to forge partnerships with communities and non-profit groups by exploring design and construction issues, providing innovative ideas and direction, educating groups on design consequences of their ideas, and creating rich learning environments for students. Faculty and students from the participating disciplines work collaboratively with communities in a wide variety of partnership projects.

In the past year, for instance, the IDI assisted the City of Spokane in modeling public and private space alternatives based on citizen values (1997); worked with the City of Rathdrum to develop an urban revitalization plan (1997); assisted a non-profit group to develop a plan for in-fill housing; developed a recreational plan for Mirabeau Point (1997); helped the County of Spokane to simulate the visual effects of growth management alternatives for the County (1998); worked with nursing students of the Intercollegiate Center for Nursing Education (ICNE) to design a Children's Transition Clinic at the YMCA which will open officially in August 1998; and came up with a new look for the Spokane Market Place (1998). Besides forging partnerships with communities, these projects provide a milieu that facilitates active intellectual inquiry, discourse, and applied research about urban and environmental quality issues that affect people’s well being.

EMERGING DIRECTIONS AND OPPORTUNITIES

The IDI has made major strides in moving toward achieving its major objectives, namely: 1) the establishment of a framework within which faculty from the design specialization areas of Architecture, Interior Design, and Landscape Architecture can collaborate; 2) the development of a regionally based option for collaborative undergraduate and graduate design programs distinctive to the Pacific Northwest and Western Canada; and 3) the establishment of graduate design programs in three disciplines consolidated into a single cohesive unit located in a common facility. The unit would have shared resources such as faculty and course work that can take advantage of and be enhanced by opportunities for multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary research activities.

The IDI is now positioned to move into the next phase in its development 1) an expansion of the participating programs to include urban and regional planning; 2) include allied disciplines of environmental sciences and the fine arts; and 3) the development of doctoral degree in design.

NEW INITIATIVES

1. Planning and Design: A New Community Partnership.

In the past year, faculty from the IDI and EWU Department of Urban and Regional Planning met on numerous occasions to discuss ways to collaborate. Both units are currently located at the WSU Spokane Riverpoint Campus. Interactions between both units are not new. In the past five years, faculty and students from IDI and EWU have conducted joint urban design studios as well as collaborated and worked together to organize a visiting lecture series. During these collaboration discussions, faculty from both units quickly realized that formalizing a collaborative relationship would enhance enrollment, produce more options and skills for students, as well as strengthen the quality of the design, construction, and planning programs. Planning classes and many aspects of planning analysis that are already offered would complement the design and construction programs at the IDI, while EWU could establish physical planning and design as one of its foundation areas.

The establishment of a formal collaborative arrangement for the delivery of planning and design education includes the following advantages and opportunities for each of the programs, as well as Washington State University and Eastern Washington University:

• Systemic exposure and opportunities for integrating urban and regional policy in design curriculum in a number of obvious content areas—growth management, urban design, environmental planning and design, land use planning, geographic information systems, housing, transportation, community planning and design, capital facilities planning, environment and behavior, and citizen involvement;

• Enhanced opportunity to educate planners in a physical and design orientation as well as specialization, thereby filling a major void in planning education;

• Enhancement of enrollment and expansion in course offerings available to both design and planning students;

• Expansion of opportunities for collaborative research and public service in design and planning;

• Establishment of a critical mass of planning and design faculty with advanced graduate degrees (12 Ph.D.s) which is extremely rare among design schools;

• Increased economic efficiency through joint course offerings;

• Sustained access to an urban location that provides both text and laboratory for design, construction, and planning education;

• Enhanced competitiveness in the delivery of planning and design services to communities in the Northwest;

• Increased opportunity for embracing the WSU Pullman based Environmental Science and Regional Planning (ESRP) as a participating program at the IDI, eliminating extant institutional barriers for bringing the ESRP program to Spokane;

• Enhanced competitiveness of students in the market place through systemic exposure to interdisciplinary learning, research, and service;

• Opportunity for the design disciplines to participate in American Indian Tribal Planning which includes a range of classes in tribal government, planning, economic development, and American Indian Architecture with emphasis on the Pacific Northwest.

As the discussions between faculty representatives from the IDI and EWU Planning flourished, it became clear that these benefits and opportunities for collaboration could be effectively realized and sustained through some form of joint organizational structure. The structure that seems feasible, effective, and timely would emphasize the offering of a graduate planning program in Spokane as a part of the IDI and refocus and strengthen the undergraduate program at EWU in Cheney.

The EWU Planning Department currently offers accredited undergraduate and graduate degrees in Urban and Regional Planning. The fourth year undergraduate and graduate programs are offered at WSU Spokane Riverpoint Campus. EWU’s undergraduate program is one of twelve professionally accredited undergraduate planning programs in the nation. The undergraduate planning program at the EWU Cheney campus could be restructured to emphasize physical planning and design as one area of concentration through joint course offerings with the IDI. This would make the program exceptionally attractive.

At both the graduate and undergraduate levels, opportunities can be provided for joint degrees between planning and design. Many architecture, interior design, and landscape architecture firms have planners as well as designers on staff. A dual degree option would increase the value of the students, providing skills that would enhance their marketability and awareness of design and planning issues. This proposed collaborative structure is consistent with WSU Spokane’s mission of focusing on graduate education and advanced studies as well as EWU’s mission of providing a comprehensive undergraduate education in Cheney.

2. Doctor of Design Degree

The design disciplines are experiencing rapid growth and change. This change is attributed largely to the number of forces that have combined to increase both the complexity and scope of design and construction issues. Technological innovations; scientific advancements; increasing public awareness of the environmental consequences of human actions; growing recognition of plural values in society; increasing fragmentation in terms of where people live, work, and play; increasingly informed citizenry who demand involvement in shaping the quality of their built and natural environments; and continuing polarization of global markets are the major driving forces. Many new players are participating in the design and construction process as well. Moreover, our educational institutions continue to face fiscal restraints in spite of rising expectations about the quality of education. Together, these forces have dramatically changed the way in which we understand, practice, and teach design and construction.

An effective and sustained response to these forces requires professionals who are educated to provide both a holistic approach to design problem solving and specialization in a specific area. This requires individuals who can conduct highly specialized design work and provide research experience in industry and academia as members of interdisciplinary design and planning teams to address real world problems. The need for such professionals is explicitly identified in the 1995 Carnegie Foundation study, Bridging Communities, by Ernest Boyer. This is a seminal study that examined architectural education in the United States. It calls for the training of future design professionals who can bridge practice, design education, and research.

By the year 2005 either a professional doctorate or Ph.D. will be the terminal degree for teaching faculty in Architecture, Landscape Architecture, and Interior Design (Proposal for an Interdisciplinary Ph.D. in Environmental Design and Planning, October 1994). There are currently about 35 to 40 Ph.D. holders entering the architecture and design marketplace each year while there are about 60 academic positions.

There are two options for advanced graduate degrees in design: Ph.D. and Doctor of Design. The former is primarily a research degree. The latter bridges research, practice, and education. While a number of design schools offer a Ph.D. degree in Architecture, Interior Design, and Landscape Architecture, Harvard University is the only school that offers a Doctor of Design Degree (D. Des.). Approximately 80 students apply to the D. Des. at Harvard each year and only four are admitted (interview with Dr. Carl Steinitz, Director of the D. Des. Program, July 16, 1998).

The establishment of a Doctor of Design and Planning Degree at WSU Spokane is timely and includes other benefits for each of the design disciplines, as well as WSU as a whole. The preliminary phase of integrating the design discipline at the University has taken place. The next steps involve a more interdisciplinary master’s degree, the development of a design prefix, and a doctoral program. This will:

• Addresses a major void in design education in the Northwest and the United States by bridging practice, research and education;

• Promotes and sustains a climate for intellectual inquiry and discourse consistent with WSU's mission;

• Trains people with enhanced critical thinking skills and the ability to challenge current thinking and standards identified by Shaun Higgins in Measuring Spokane (1998) as a key skill in developing Spokane;

• Complements existing graduate programs offered at the IDI (second professional research-oriented master degree programs flourish when a doctoral program is in place);

• A timely response to design professionals in the Spokane area who have clearly expressed the need for advanced graduate degrees.