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NTNU – THE FACULTY OF ARCHITECTURE AND FINE ART
9
The mandate of the Review Committee was to assist the
Faculty of Architecture and Fine Art at NTNU to undertake
a thorough evaluation process of the five year Masters
program in Architecture and the two year International
Masters programme in Sustainable Architecture. We were
asked to take five important perspectives into consider-
ation, namely the academic perspective, the pedagogic
perspective, sustainability, the perspective of industry and
the student perspective.
From the outset we identified, through discussion and
common agreement, a set of values and operating prin-
ciples that would inform our work and our relations with
all those who would be contributing to the review process.
We felt that the process of the review should take the form
of an ongoing dialogical process between the School and
the Committee, so that decisions and emerging findings
would be transparent and that the direction that the review
was taking would always be a matter of consultation and
consensus. This approach was designed to establish the
review as a participatory process intended to strengthen
the School’s ownership of its development and outcome.
A further key dimension of our approach was the central-
ity of the student voice. This element was designed into
our methodology to the extent that NTNU students would
play an active part in the review process and would also
have representation on the Review Committee. Finally it
was agreed that our findings and conclusions would be
evidence-based, drawing upon data gathered from the
experience of various stakeholder groups at NTNU.
The aims of the Review were as follows:
• to assist the Faculty and its leadership to gain useful
insights, and gain fresh inputs, into their understanding
of fundamental aspects of their educational provision
– their core values, identity and tradition – to assess the
extent to which current aspirations were being realised.
• to enable the Faculty and its leadership to use the
evaluation’s findings as a resource to develop,
re-envision and adapt the two programs so that their
profile, core values and structure might be harmonised in
an effective and integral fashion.
The Review Committee sought to engage representative
groups of staff, students and other stakeholders in discus-
sions about the quality of current educational provision,
modes of possible enhancement and means of supporting
the community’s commitment to, and engagement in,
future development of the curriculum.
The Committee sought to establish a process of enhance-
ment-led formative evaluation that would place emphasis
on participation and be in keeping with the inclusive values
and open culture of the School. It sought also to gener-
ate information of a qualitative, quantitative and graphical
nature that would be of practical assistance to the Faculty
leadership and help inform their future decision-making
processes.
IMPRESSIONS GAINED
The Committee were impressed with the levels of ambi-
tion and commitment encountered in their dealings with
NTNU staff and students. An impression was gained of a
future-oriented, highly reflective department with a strong
tradition of collaboration, a hospitable culture of warm
hearted people, and a climate of intellectual rigour.
The members of the Review Committee would like to
thank the staff and students of the Faculty for the spirit
of collaboration, collegiality, openness and frankness in
which the evaluation took place. Their accommodating and
enthusiastic response assisted the Committee immeas-
urably in their work and the climate of professional and
personal trust that was established permitted members of
the Committee to act genuinely in the role of critical friend.
Our task became both a pleasure, and a rewarding learn-
ing experience in the company of talented and interesting
colleagues.
1. Introduction