March 30, 2011 – Vignette Seminar

The IAC committee will be offering a free study session for Intern Architects who are preparing for the ARE Exams. This seminars emphasis will placed on approaches for working through the vignette portions for PPP and SPD, focusing on problem-solving and time management strategies.

This seminar will run from 6:00PM to 7:30PM at the AIBC Architecture Centre. The seminar will provide strategies and other tips for each exam, and are not intended to cover specific exam content. It would be helpful to have some familiarity with the exam materials and some experience with the graphic practice program prior to attending the respective seminars.

Introductory material and resources can be located at Intern Architect Exam Process and Resources,

To reserve a spot for this seminar, or if you have any questions, you can contact Emily Tyler, Registration & Licensing Administration Assistant, at 604 683 8588 ext. 324 or etyler@aibc.ca.

Programming, Planning + Practice (PPP)

This exam has one graphic vignette– Site Zoning.

Site Planning + Design (SPD)

This exam has two graphic vignettes – Site Grading and Site Design

Annual Intern Event!

Please join us in an enthusiastic celebration of mentorship!

The AIBC and the Intern Architect Committee invite you and your mentor to attend the upcoming Mentor – Mentee Event. This event is an informal and social evening dedicated to building mentor relationships across all levels of the profession, from students and architectural graduates to Intern Architects and fully-registered members.

Thursday, November 4
5:30 – 8:30 p.m.
AIBC Gallery (#100 – 440 Cambie Street at Pender)
Vancouver, BC V6B 2N5

Complimentary refreshments, entertainment and prizes.

While mentorship is a required part of the Intern Architect Program, it happens more informally throughout one’s career as an architect. Mentors enhance education, offer advice and direction for professional experience, and help build professional networks. They are teachers, counselors and friends.

No matter how far you are through the IA program, chances are your mentor has been a large and positive part of your internship experience. This gathering is the perfect opportunity to not only thank your mentor, but to also connect with other IAs and members of the profession.

To confirm you attendance, please r.s.v.p. to Courtney Healey IA.AIBC (courtney.healey@gmail.com) or Registration and Licensing Administration Assistant Emily Tyler (etyler@aibc.ca).

We look forward to seeing you there.

PRAM

Dear Interns Architects,

There seems to be a high rate of attrition of women in the architectural profession.
With a copy of the 2008 AIBC Member Directory, a pencil and a calculator, I recently tallied some numbers.

In 2008…
51% of the population of Metro Vancouver was women.
45% of the graduating class at UBC SALA were women.
42% of the award recipients at UBC SALA were women
38% of the intern membership at the AIBC were women.
11% of the registered architects (MAIBC) at the AIBC were women.
2% of BC architecture firms greater than four people were owned by women.

I'm not an Ipsos Reid pollster - but I think these numbers indicate a problem.
For some reason, significant numbers of women are choosing to leave the profession during their internship.

Hmmm...I wonder why?

Low pay?
Long hours?
Laddish culture?
Family unfriendly work environment?

Pram In The Hall is a feature posted on the AIBC website which begins to address this issue. It consists of a series of interviews with women and men who practice while raising children.

There are some "resources" listed as well.
Be sure to have a look at the 2003 RIBA study titled "Why Women Leave Architecture" - it's surprisingly good reading. (The issue of "sidelining" really hit home for me).

And finally, please post a comment on the "feedback" page if you feel inclined.
The powers at be are aware that this is an important issue,
and every comment posted just adds more traction.

Thank You,

Stephanie Robb MAIBC
(Mother, Principal, Registration & Licensing Board Member, and 2010 Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia Medal in Architecture recipient)

Intern Survey Part 1: Summary and Response

The first in a series of Intern Surveys was concluded in 2009. The results of that survey reveal interesting information which will be considered by not only the Intern Architect Committee, but also the Registration and Licensing Board and, ultimately, Council itself.

If you would like to see the summary results of the survey, they are available at the Survey Monkey site.

First of all, we were gratified that 84 interns chose to respond to the survey (about 20% of the intern group). Thank you to all who responded. This survey covered background information such as route of entry to internship, employment situations and compensation. Future surveys will drill down into more specific areas and issues of concern for interns and the profession.

Some of the interesting “learnings” from this survey include:

• The most important factor for interns’ choice of firm appears to be the level of responsibility granted. This is overwhelmingly so, with over 90 percent of responses in the somewhat to very important range. Compensation, reputation of firm, firm practice emphasis, and commitment to interns fall in a roughly equal band at 72-78 percent somewhat to very important. Surprisingly, benefits and personal/family considerations, rank relatively low on the scale.

• A considerable number of respondents (35%) that they do not get sufficient exposure to the necessary range of work to complete their CERB hours. The detailed responses reveal that contract and construction administration are the areas of most concern. This is borne out by results of oral review exams where these areas are the most common ones in which candidates fall short.
• On the brighter side, perhaps, is that almost half of the respondents report salaries of $55,000 or more. This is tempered by the comments received on the survey that it was not sufficiently granular at the $60,000 or more level and by the fact that 30% of interns report that they are not being compensated for overtime as is required by employment legislation in BC.
• Most telling of all are the responses to questions 16 through 19 which reveal general dissatisfaction with the way in which interns are valued and compensated. A large majority (over 70 percent) of respondents feel that they have not been adequately compensated and almost 60 percent of respondents report that they do not feel that the time and energy spent towards getting registered has not been worthwhile. The detailed responses to this question reveal a range of issues ranging from educational experience, length and difficulty of the registration process, compensation and work-life issues, and direction of the profession itself as contributing factors. Future surveys will look at some of these issues in more detail.
• Closing out on this theme, question 20 asked for ideas and suggestions about intern surveys. There were a number of useful responses/themes which will help improve how we do surveys and provide topics for future surveys. Stay tuned.

AIBC Council Nominations

Nominations are now being accepted for the 2010/11 AIBC Council. One of the positions available is the Intern Architect Liaison. This is your opportunity to help shape the body responsible for the governance of the profession in this province and represent the intern architects of the AIBC. Your respective nomination form will soon arriving in the mail. They are also available online, on the AIBC Council page. All nominations must be received at the AIBC offices no later than 4:30 p.m. on Thursday, March 18, 2010. The election closes at the Annual Meeting on May 8, 2010.

Your IAC encourages anyone who is interested in getting involved to apply!

2010 ARE Preparation Seminars

The Intern Architect Committee will be holding a series of free ARE preparation seminars over the coming weeks and months to help interns prepare for the exams. The seminars will be held approximately every two weeks, and will generally run from 6:00pm to 7:00pm at the AIBC Architecture Centre in Vancouver. Dates below are still subject to change. Please check back regularly to confirm that the seminar schedule is accurate.

These seminars are designed to provide strategies and other tips for each exam, and are not intended to cover specific exam content. It would be helpful to have some familiarity with the exam materials and some experience with the graphic practice program prior to attending the respective seminars, except of course for the introductory seminar.

Introduction to the AREs Wed Mar 10
Programming Planning and Practice Mon Mar 15
Site Planning and Design Mon Mar 22
Schematic Design Wed Apr 07 **
Building Design and Construction Systems Mon Apr 19**
Structural Systems Mon May 17
Building Systems Mon May 31
Construction Documents and Services Mon Jun 14

** Please note these two sessions have swapped dates.

ARE 4.0 Exam Seminar Presenters

The Intern Architect Committee would like to invite interns who have written (and passed) some of the ARE 4.0 exams to serve as volunteer presenters for this year's exam preparation seminars. The 30 to 45-minute seminars are designed to provide topical exam-taking advice to interns who are about to write each exam, and thus will focus more on strategy than on specific content. Please contact us if you are interested in volunteering for any of these positions. Thanks!

Intern Architect Event 2009: 20x20

With summer now officially over, it is time to announce the upcoming annual Intern Architect event. The Intern Architect Committee (IAC) has been discussing this issue, and has chosen to revisit the 20x20 event organized last year. Our intent is to use this Pecha Kucha inspired event as an ongoing and continuing event that would be organized at regular intervals in the future.

As a refresher to those unaware of the origins of this type of event, Pecha Kucha originated in Japan in the late 1990s as a method devised by graphic artists to present their work while minimizing the amount of constraints and requirements. Each presenter prepares an audio visual based piece, consisting of 20 images, with each being shown for 20 seconds. This ensures the presentations do not last more than six minutes, allowing many presenters to speak during one event. Today the Pecha Kucha formula has been replicated throughout the world and these types of events are a common occurrence in numerous cities.

This year’s event will take place on Thursday, November 12th at the Architecture Gallery (AIBC). The event will start at 17:30 and refreshments, as always, will be provided.

We are looking for between five and eight speakers for this event. Preference will be given to Intern Architects and architecture students. Presenters will have the opportunity to showcase their work, ideas, or other interests. An honorarium will be presented to all of the speakers. Please contact us if you are interested in being a presenter at this year's event.

In order to ensure the event is well attended and financed, the IAC will to launch a targeted advertising and sponsorship campaign. Emails and flyers will follow shortly. To encourage guests to come and participate in the event, a draw for numerous architecturally-themed prizes will also be organised.

Please mark your calendars, and we the hope to see many of you at this exciting event!

AIBC Intern Architect Survey Results (Part 1)

Thank you to those who participated in the survey. The survey results will be used by the AIBC’s Registration and Licensing Board as well as the National Intern Architect Program Task Force to drive changes to the Intern Architect Program (IAP). To view the results of the first survey, click here. Please stay tuned, as we will have a second survey posted soon. The following is a summary of the results written by Johnnie Kuo IA.AIBC, a member of the Intern Architect Committee:

The survey has drawn its result from 59 responses. Most respondents (over 84%) have never been registered as intern architects outside of Canada or BC. There is a small percentage (15%) of respondents who are registered architects outside of Canada. Nearly 73% of respondent interns are employed full time, while 12% are unemployed.

Highlights from the survey results:

• When choosing firms, level of responsibility granted is rated “Very Important’ for 63% of respondents, size of firm and benefits are rated “Somewhat Important” by 42% of respondents; identity of firm principals seems to be least important.
• Over 60% of interns feel they are sufficiently exposed to a range of work that allow them to fulfill CERB requirement; among the remaining 37%, most often identified issues are lack of contract administration, construction and site related experience.
• Two-thirds of respondents are paid annual salary, compensated for overtime pay that is either straight time banked as holiday time or time-and-a-half paid out/towards holidays. The same percentage reported that they do not supplement income with outside work.
• 25% of respondents are paid 60K or more; about 56% are paid between 45K and 60K annually. The same percentage of respondents feel their compensation package is fair. Two-thirds of respondents reported that their compensation package insufficient to meet their living needs.
• Most commonly provided benefits are full payment of AIBC annual dues, cost shared dental, and AIBC PD courses.
• Most concerning is the fact that nearly 60% of respondents do not find the time and effort spend towards getting registered as an architect worth it from a professional or personal perspective. They also do not feel that they have been adequately compensated financially for the time and effort already spent towards getting registered.

Future survey topics and pertinent comments include:

• Employment standards and compensation
• Ethics
• AIBC improved monitoring or regulation of the current system to ensure interns are getting appropriate experience
• NCARB
• Support and respect for interns in their professional development, work environment, and finances
• Intern resources and peer support (juggling demands from work, exams, and courses while maintaining a healthy life style)
• Internship process here in BC vs. elsewhere
• CERB and exams, NCARB exams vs. EXAC
• Young firms and design culture
• Registration requirements
• Perspectives from self-employed or contract-base interns
• Unemployment

Intern Representative Nominations Due

Just a reminder that nominations for the Intern rep on the AIBC Council for this coming year are due on March 19, 2009. More information on this position and the nomination form can be found at the AIBC Website.

Oral Review Preparation Workshop

The Intern Architect Committee will be hosting an Oral Review Preparation Workshop on Wednesday, January 28th, 2009 from 6:00pm to 8:00pm at the AIBC. All interns are welcome to attend. The Oral Review session will be held on February 18th and 19th, 2009. The application form is available to download from the AIBC website. The Oral Review is open to those Intern Architects who have: ·completed and logged at least 2800 hours (preferably completed all of the required hours); and ·completed the required AIBC courses.

Happy Holidays!

from the AIBC Intern Architect Committee!

February 2009 Oral Reviews

The application form for the next Oral Review session is available to download from the AIBC website. The Oral Review is open to those Intern Architects who have:

·completed and logged at least 2800 hours (preferably completed all of the required hours); and
·completed the required AIBC courses.

The Oral Review session will be held on February 18th and 19th, 2009. The Intern Architect Committee will be hosting an Oral Review Preparation Workshop on Wednesday, January, 28, 2009 at 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm at the AIBC offices. All those planning to sit an oral review this round are welcome to attend.

Annual Intern Event 20x20

The annual intern event, hosted by the Intern Archietct Committee was held at the AIBC on November 6th. This year's event, 20x20, was based on Pecha Kucha - an increasingly popular show-and-tell format through which presenters are allowed 20 images and given up to 20 seconds per image to speak. This lively evening attracted 5 diverse presentations. It was an unqualified success!! We are particularly happy with the turn-out wich saw many interns attending the presentations and sharing fellowship, food, drink and good conversation. The 5 brave presenters each received gift cards in the amount of $100. Six lucky attendees won gift cards for various venues worth $50 as door prizes.

The gifts and prizes were generously sponsored by the Architectural Foundation of British Columbia for which we are deeply grateful.

Following are the list of presenters and their respective topics.

• Allison Holden : Femininity in Architecture
• Ariane Truong : Floating Architecture
• Varouj Gumuchian & Gary Schilling : Eclectic Creativity
• May So : A Land Flowing with Milk: Rothiemay Farm, New Brunswick
• Abdel Munem Amin : Amazonas Brasilias : A tale of a broken Nomad

Considerable interest was expressed in repeating this event next year -- something the Intern Architect Committee is keen to do. For those who are interested in presenting a topic at the next intern event, please send an email to interncommittee@yahoo.com and a brief description of your topic.

Solid Footing for General Structures Seminar

by Jeff LeMay IA.AIBC

The recent ARE General Structures workshop featuring David Thaddeus, AIA, NCARB, provided an excellent overview of structural concepts and solid preparation for the ARE General Structures exam. The 3-day workshop hosted by the AIBC in Vancouver November 7th -9th was attended by 27 intern architects from B.C., Washington, and as far away as California.

David Thaddeus’s amicable and engaging communication style made the three full days in seminar not only bearable but often enjoyable.

David’s extensive collection of 2D models made for the overhead projector clearly depicted the transformations that occur in structures under various loading conditions. His use of colour coding for different types of forces in his digital presentation was consistent throughout the seminar and made note taking and review easy. David never hesitated to pause for questions and confirm we were all on track eliminating our anxiety over being left behind.

David’s presentation was a thoughtful balance of structural concepts, equations and example questions from the exam. The concepts presented formed a useful review of the structures courses taken in school, but David presented them in a way that made them accessible for interns with or without a structures-heavy education. These concepts were underscored by a slide show including images of innovative design solutions and arresting structural failures.

The equations David presented served to consistently and cogently underscore the concepts. Eemphasis was placed one those most often featured in the exam. David successfully straddled the line between the 3.1 and 4.0 exams, ensuring a useful seminar for interns on both exam tracks. Significant time was allotted for practice questions. David also offered useful time saving strategies such as eliminating impossible answers from multiple choice questions and thereby avoiding unnecessary math operations.

This engaging and useful seminar is a recommended event not only to interns studying for General Structures but also to those who wish to enhance their structural knowledge for use in practice.

Testimony from Abdel Amin IA.AIBC:

"The things I found useful were the techniques Thaddeus presented to save time and eliminate needing to calculate every math question. He offered an exam taking plan of attack which I thought eliminated the need to ‘think’ during the exam and tempt misinterpretations. He made it simple and quick so you weren’t prone to confuse terms, especially when the equations were involved. I also felt that he explained the concepts more clearly where the Kaplan Study Guide was unnecessarily math heavy and light on explanations. He explained the theories better and we were better equipped to do the exam because of that. There isn’t too many calculations in that exam compared to the theory so if you don’t have the theory down, you may have trouble with the majority of the questions.

Also, the 2D structural models that he had were very useful. You can see clear as daylight what happens when forces act on the systems that are under consideration. I need to see it to believe it. You can talk for hours but if I can’t see it/ visualize it I won’t believe it and it becomes much harder for me to even remember it for the exam. I don’t think I am alone in thinking like this.

If I were to do all this again, I would schedule the Thaddeus course to be 2 weeks before my exam. I feel you need to do some studying before to get the most out of the course but leave yourself enough time to be able to read and review new concepts that you weren’t aware of after the course. I ran out of that time and had to wing it as much as I could as it was eating into my review time. I scheduled the exam for the Friday after the course so I ran out of time to thoroughly review the additional readings that he recommended.

The money for the course is well worth it. For the amount of time that you are there, a total of almost 30 hrs I think, it works out to be around $10/hr. Less than half of what you would spend on a tutor or another course which isn’t catered to passing the ARE specifically."

The Intern Architect Committee will be arranging for Prof. Thaddeus’ return for 2009. Stay tuned for further details.

Intern Professional Development Courses

The AIBC Professional Development Department has posted the 2009 Course Schedule. To register for your 4 mandatory courses and 2 elective courses go to http://aibc.ca/member_resources/professional_dev/pdf/2009%20PD%20Course%20Schedule.pdf. Note that you can substitute BC Building Code I & II for more in depth equivalent at BCIT noted below.

Jan 15 Management of the Project
Jan 29 Ethics, Act & Bylaws
Mar 06 Law & the Architect
Mar 13 BC Building Code I
Apr 17 Building Envelope Principles
May 21 BC Building Code II
May 29 Construction Administration
Jun 19 Ethics, the Architect’s Act & Bylaws
Sep 11 Building Envelope Principles
Sep 24 Ethics, Act & Bylaws
Oct 16 Management of the Project
Oct 22 BC Building Code I
Oct 30 BC Building Code II

Nov 13 Law & the Architect

Nov 19 Blueprint for Business
Nov 20 Construction Administration
Nov 26 Building Envelope Principles
Dec 4 Ethics, Act & Bylaws

BLDG 1830 – BC Building Code: Part 3 (accepted in lieu of AIBC Building Code I and II)
Introduction to building code requirements related to Part 3 of the 2006 B.C. Building Code. Provides students with basic skills and a general working knowledge of the code to analyze Part 3 buildings. Students must bring B.C. Building Code to the first class. This comprehensive course can be taken in lieu of the two required full day courses at the AIBC: BC Building Code I and BC Building Code II.

Monday nights 6:45-9:45, January 12 to March 30 (12 weeks)
http://www.bcit.ca/study/courses/bldg1830

BLDG 1825 –BC Building Code: Multi-unit and Small Buildings
Monday nights 6:45 to 9:45, January 12 to March 30 (12 weeks), $450.
http://www.bcit.ca/study/courses/bldg1825

BLDG 1835 – Part 3 Advanced (prerequisite: BLDG 1830)
Thursday nights 6:45 to 9:45, January 22 to February 26 (6weeks), $250.
http://www.bcit.ca/study/courses/bldg1835


BLDG 1830, Introduction to BC Building Code Part 3, at BCIT can replace the two mandatory AIBC courses covering the same topic. The topic of BLDG 1830 is Part 3 of the BC Building Code and deals with Fire Protection, Occupant Safety and Accessibility for large buildings.

Participants are expected to bring their own copy of the BC Building Code. Classes run once a week in the evenings for 12 weeks at the Burnaby campus of BCIT. One can expect about 2 hours of studying outside of the course as a minimum to take it all in. This fall BLDG 1830 will run on Monday nights from 6:45 to 9:45 from January 12 through March 30 (12 weeks). The course fee is $450.

Since the course is directly related to your internship (it can replace the two full day courses BC Building Code I & II at the AIBC) and to your training as valued member of your office team, ask your firm if they will cover the course fee.

If your firm will not pay for your professional training you will still find that BLDG 1830 is similar in cost to the two full day courses otherwise required by the AIBC. Go to http://www.bcit.ca/ for a complete list of architecturally related course for next term.

Intern Event and 20x20 Show

Since 2003 the Pecha Kucha presentation format of 20 images lasting 20 seconds each has been spreading around the world. This year we’re going to bring that format to our yearly intern party!

Join us on Thursday night, November 6th for this year’s Intern Party and 20x20 Show with door prizes, music, free food and drinks. Make sure to mark it down on your calendar and come on down to the AIBC next Thursday night! Please send a quick r.s.v.p. to the Intern Architect Committee at interncommittee@yahoo.com so that we have a good idea of numbers for catering. The Intern Architect Committee would like to thank the Architecture Foundation of British Columbia for sponsoring the door prizes for this event.

LAST CALL - Registration for David Thaddeus’ Structures Seminar

On Friday November 7th, David Thaddeus will begin his 3-day (Friday – Sunday) intensive Structures workshop to help prepare interns for the ARE Structures exam. There are still spaces available for this seminar and, in fact, David Thaddeus would like to see more registrants come forward. This course is great for people who want to absorb structures concepts in a hands on format prior to taking the ARE Structures exam. If you are interested please click here for the registration form. The deadline for registration has been extended to Thursday, October 30th at 5:00 pm. If you have any questions you can email the AIBC’s Registration Coordinator, Róisín O’Neill at roneill@aibc.ca. For a full description of the course please see last month’s blog.

Corrected Intern Committee Email

Last month we published an incorrect email address in our newsletter and 20 x 20 poster. The correct email is interncommittee@yahoo.com. If you went to the trouble to send us a comment or question, please re-send it to this account. We apologize for any inconvenience. Your email goes directly to your Intern Architect Committee (Patrick Schilling IA, Johnnie Kuo IA, Abdel Amin IA, Baldwin Hum IA, Anthony Milkovich IA, Jason Herzog IA, Scott Staniul IA, and Paul Sukava IA). We hope this gives you the confidence to send us your unfiltered thoughts on the program, courses, fees, exams, oral review preparation, and all things intern related. So let’s hear from you!

Feedback

This newsletter is formed and compiled by interns for interns of the AIBC. Do you like it? Find it useful? Have comments? Suggestions? Send us an e-mail to interncommittee@yahoo.com. Do you have any concerns about the process, structure, fees, or requirements of the AIBC’s Intern Architect Program? If you send us an e-mail, we can bring forward your issue for discussion at the next Intern Architect Committee meeting. Proposals for change begin with expressions of concern, so please take five minutes to let us know what's on your mind.