Niels Barrett PhD.pdf - OpenAIR @ RGU - Robert Gordon University

The rise of a Profession within a ProfessionPrefaceThe Development of the Architectural Technology Discipline within the Profession of ArchitectureThis means that the technologists are not recognised to the same extent as the twoother groups who in the public opinion have their well defined professions with clearareas of responsibility. People ignore the fact that the technologists are doing animportant part of the work belonging to the profession of architecture. I have neverfelt that the technologists should have their own separate profession because thatwould obviously cause a more split up design process with more risk for mistakes.They share a profession with the architects and it appears fair to me that thisbecomes recognised somehow.A fact that emphasises to me that architects’ education only cover the initial parts ofthe work an architect firm is responsible for, is the fact that some graduatedarchitects have wanted to educate themselves as technologists as well. We haveduring the years had the pleasure of helping a number of architects to becomearchitectural technologists and they have in general been very fond of it. At least theyfelt a need for the kind of knowledge to be acquired at our school. Normally, wehave given this kind of applicant credits to enter our third or fourth semester and thathas proved to be successful.ProjectsOf other happenings relevant to the subject, I can tell that I, in the late 1990s, wasrunning a couple of European Social Fund supported projects aiming to helpunemployed female professionals into employment. It was under the NOWprogramme(New Opportunities for Women). Thus being able to compare thecapabilities of the different professionals I got an even clearer view of the differencesbetween architects, technologists and building engineers, which were the threegroups we were dealing with. There were clear cultural differences and knowledgedifferences and they met the challenges in three different ways. To all of them theprogramme they had to pass constituted a new field of activities.21