Daring students pitch to industry professionals
The gap between finalising an assignment and presenting a project to the 鈥榬eal world鈥� can be intimidating for students and requires a rethink of academic objectives in light of larger professional and community priorities. Students in the program recently had their first exposure to professional practice through the aptly titled program, Dare听to听Pitch.
Armed with a three-minute 鈥榩echa kucha鈥� style presentation, around 200 Masters students swarmed out in small groups to visit the offices of architecture practices across Sydney. Their hosts included architectural practices Crone, COX, fjmt, Jacobs, Architectus, Lacoste + Stevenson, TZG, and others as well as real estate investment group Mirvac. In front of a room of industry professionals, the students presented their projects, explaining their ideas, approaches and innovations and how these could address current problems or open up new opportunities for the built environment.
, Coordinator of the Digital Architecture Ressearch Studio believes that 鈥減resenting their work to industry experts off-campus was a good experience for students,鈥� and he got the sense that 鈥渢he encouraging feedback and the engaging discussions gave the students more confidence that what they are producing is relevant and of the standard expected by the industry.鈥�
highlighted that there are equally benefits for the host practices: 鈥淲e had two of the senior architects of Jacobs give constructive and well-articulated feedback, commenting that they appreciated the opportunity to see a range of fresh ideas from students.鈥�
On the behalf of architectus, I鈥檇 like to thank the students for sharing an interesting, creative and intelligent range of thinking and work at the recent presentations.
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This event forms part of what Master of Architecture Program Director hopes will become a broader professional engagement initiative. 鈥淚 hope students will learn how听to听articulate the central ideas and benefits of their projects and explain how they contribute听to听the solution of real world problems,鈥� Sandra L枚schke explains. 鈥淚 want them to have the chance to present in non-familiar contexts and to gain confidence in听pitching their ideas to large, non-academic audiences. And, of course, it's also an opportunity for them to make contact听with听potential future employers.鈥�