From discussions on how to make Texas towns more resilient to extreme water events to highlighting the struggles of historical preservation, a wide variety of topics and ideas were discussed at the College of Architecture 20th Annual Research Symposium.
At the Preston Geren Auditorium on Oct. 29, students and faculty gathered together for the Natural, Built, Virtual Research Symposium: “Interdisciplinarity,” where researchers discussed their ideas for the future of architecture and visualization in various areas of society, like journalism, Dungeons & Dragons and undergraduate attendance on Fridays.
Although appearing to be unrelated, the diversity of topics is what made the symposium unique, according to visualization graduate student Courtney Brake.
“It was definitely interesting in the sense that there was more diversity of studies and topics going on than I thought,” Brake said. “The first presenter talked about breast cancer centers and how to better design them, and someone else did a presentation about nature on their property.”
Along with representing the diversity of studies in the college, the symposium aimed to show how scholars in different departments work together, according to executive Associate Dean of the College of Architecture Dawn Jourdan.
“The theme is ‘interdisciplinary’ in order to showcase how scholars in different departments and fields work together,” Jourdan said. “[The symposium] allows us to answer questions that run the full gamut of the college.”
The research symposium is also meant to help students by familiarizing them with the faculty and staff of the college as well giving them research experience, according to Jourdan.
“The symposium helps students by introducing them to faculty and their research, how to do their own research and it gives them the opportunity to show their doctoral work either independently or with faculty,” Jourdan said.
For Brake, the research symposium helped new students get a better understanding of the college and what is available to study.
“[The symposium] gives students a broader perspective of what’s going on so if they’re interested in something in particular, they can talk to one of these presenters and see what is going on in that area,” Brake said.
According to presenter and associate dean for Outreach and Diversity Cecilia Giusti, the symposium is a chance for presenters to share their work with other faculty and students.
“This is an opportunity to show what we’ve done to other colleagues and students,” Giusti said. “And it’s nice because you get to know what other people are doing, and when you’re doing your own research, you don’t know about others. It also allows us [researchers] to find others working on similar projects and join forces.”