Students Complete Interdisciplinary Architecture Project

Grade 7 students envisioned themselves as architects, city planners, and business owners as they partnered with Christian Hughes of Drafting Dreams on an urban redevelopment project centered around his neighborhood of Homewood. Challenged to design a to-scale dwelling that would positively impact the Homewood business corridor, students learned not only the basic principles and elements of architecture and urban design—like reading a scale, rendering floor plans, and showing proportion—but about Homewood, its history, and its revitalization.
In preparation for the urban architecture project, Director of Equity and Inclusion Ciera Young spoke with students about race, economic disparity, and what it means to respectfully enter, learn from, and give back to communities different from your own. “At Ellis, we strive to educate the girls in the classroom and in the local community. It’s important that students learn from our neighbors, work with our neighbors, and have the shared language and compassion to do so respectfully.”

To get a better understanding of what the neighborhood and business corridor look like, Mr. Hughes led the seventh grade class on a tour of Homewood and introduced them to community stakeholder Kerri  Clauser who shared the history of the community and its spaces. Students then took photographs along N. Homewood Avenue, sketched their surrounding in notebooks, and measured and documented the business corridor lots. Following the tour, LaToya Johnson-Rainey, VP of the Homewood-Brushton Business Association, Rev. Samuel Ware, Chair of the Homewood Community Development Collaborative, and Zinna Scott, board member of Operation Better Block, visited Ellis to discuss their roles in Homewood, their personal connections to the neighborhood, and their recommendations for the business corridor.

Taking feedback and insights from Ms. Young, Mr. Hughes, and community members into account, students drafted their business proposals and used SketchUp—a 3D modeling program— to bring their ideas to life on screen. Once their plans were complete, students returned to Homewood to visit with second grade students at Faison Elementary School and shared their ideas for the neighborhood. From a roller rink and a pharmacy, to an organic grocery store and kid-friendly makerspace, the students’ proposals were met with excitement from Faison students. “It was a great learning experience for the girls to meet and interact with second graders from at Faison Elementary,” said Visual Arts Teacher Linda Tonetti Dugan. “They were excited to share their ideas and happy to meet our neighbors across Penn Avenue.”

Merging the fine arts and the social sciences, this experiential learning opportunity gave students a unique, multifaceted understanding of design, culture, diversity, and the neighborhood of Homewood. In an anonymous survey from the class, students said they “learned that when remodeling a community you must include members of the community in every stage of the process” and that “architecture is important for bringing together cultures even if you don’t realize it.” Through meaningful, transdisciplinary experiences like the urban redevelopment project, students learn to be creative problem-solvers and flexible thinkers who lead lives of purpose, inclusion, and empathy.
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