RAPID SHELTER DISPLACED PEOPLE SPRING 2023
Assignment 3:
Date: March 7, 2023
Due: April 2, 2023

First Draft

As noted within prior assignments, the term project topic can be 1. a thesis, 2. a hypothetical program or policy, or 3. a design prototype or physical planning specification. Within this exercise you are to develop a first draft or sketch of your term project. Your approach should address the needs or identify the circumstances of any forcibly displaced community, such as victims of a natural disaster, social and political persecution, or armed conflict. Given the diverse areas of interest in the class, you may interpret the assignment on an independent theme. Don't hesitate to consult with Earl Mark or Madeleine Zahn over the next two weeks to further establish your interpretation of the requirements and first draft sketch and narrow down your focus..

Discussion Groups

Beginning the week of March 12th, we will begin to use breakout sessions to focus discussion within smaller groups that have an affinity with respect to case study themes in common. Based upon the short informal presentations within each group made on March 12th and/or March 19th, you may decide to explore the themes you may have in common with other members of the group and consider opportunities to share some research efforts or you may decide to work more independently.  If you have any questions please contact Earl Mark or Madeleine Zahn. If you haven't fully decided which other case studies in the classwould be compatible, but potentially would like to colloborate on research, then Earl Mark or Madeleine Zahn will be availble to try to help you to find a match.

General Objectives

1. Speculate on a program, policy, design proposition, researchable question or set of guildlines with impact on physical living space and related facilities for a refugee commuity or another type of forcibly displaced community. You may approach this speculation at discretionary scale. That is, develop your proposal for implementation minimally at the multiple-family, community, block, sector or settlementlevel according to the UNHCR definition (see UNHCR Settlement Folio, UNHCR Shelter and Settlement Section, Geneva, Switzerland, March 2016). For most projects this is the most likely scenario that makes sense; however, you are welcome to make the case for a different scale, including an intervention within a longer standing community that has transitioned from a short-term period of 1 to 1 years to mid-term period of 2 to 5 years or longer term semi-permanent or more permanent period.

You also are free to address this exercise at the smallest scale of just one to four family modules or to focus on other kinds of buiding structures, interventions, more limited devices, or outdoor space uses. The UNHCR Settlement Folio that we've already discussed may also be helpful to you in identifying four real life existing scenarios that your work could address. That is, try to relate your topic to an issue related to the physical living environment that a forcibly displaced person may find themselves within that has similar characteristics of or is more directly a UNHCR settlement, or, seek out a context in which the UNHCR type system could be relevant.

The UNHCR aggregations of residential structures may be helpful in establishing a baseline for what size population you wish to address:

UNHCR Handbook For Emergencies, Community Plan. This plan with the family units at roughly 45 degree angle varies from the standard orthographic and parallel arrangement for family units, UNHCR Handbook For Emergencies, UNHCR Geneva Switzerland, 2007. (http://www.ifrc.org/PageFiles/95884/D.01.03.%20Handbook%20for%20Emergencies_UNHCR.pdf).

2. Develop one or two alternative sketches or directions for your project graphically (e.g., archecture site plan, GIS map, or non-architectural plan diagram) as contrasting alternatives to give some greater perspective to your options. Students with non-design backgrounds or no background in drawing should sketch more simply, if just at the level of a doodle, and may want to speak with Earl Mark or Madeleine Zahn for additional guidance on how to go about it. You are also welcome to experiment with the visualization AI technology Copilot (select this link) provided by Microscoft available free to all students at UVA, with the caveat that you should acknowlege it as a part of your methodology.

3. Relate your project to the background context of physical setting, climate, built and natural environment where displaced people are located, such as at an UNHCR encampment or an alternative location. *

* While not a strict requirement, if each student developed a sketch or first draft set of discoveries that could be related to a very typical UNHCR model of an encampment, it would allow all particpants in the seminar to compare issues in a way that is more relatable to one another and help to facilitate the exhange of ideas.

Submission requirement

1. A four page page summary, revised from assignment 2, should include the key proposition and precedents. It should further develop a refined critical-path calendar plan, and some draft of potential deliverables. If appropriate to the nature of the topic, it may also optionally include hand constructed or computer models, drawings, maps, renderings, animations, CAD or GIS data files. It is stongly recommended that you include an original drawing or diagram with physical or spatial information as you transition from research to your own more speculative propositions.

2. Prepare a brief power point or PDF file for a 5 min. presentation overview of your approach to the class by the assignment due date of April 2 (we will stagger these discussions over the next few classes).

3. The submision should be posted to the submit folder on classes server for ARCH5500-ARCH8500-Mark-SPR2024 and under the sub-folder "submit/lastname_firstname/assignment3" or equivalently placed in your file drop folder on the Class Collab site. Email notification to Earl Mark and to Madeleine Zahn when making the submission.