Courtesy of the coronavirus, universities are closed around the world, and classrooms are now entertained over video conferencing. This is not overly dramatic as this temporary arrangement will eclipse after cases are contained, and classes will resume soon after. However, the impacts on the university ecosystem and on the urban fabric will require immediate renovations in higher education that will shape the architectural syllabus for years to come.
Many universities around the world are facing a once in a century event, and younger ones a once in a lifetime event. Their future will be defined by their flexibility to do business. While university campuses have often been hailed as the exemplar of urban planning in many instances, as they host their primary population in immediate proximity to services, they are not resilient or adaptive systems. This is because there have not been major disruptions to this sector for the past 50 or 100 years. And continuous money flows have sustained this rigidity in planning and operation, which is now synonymous to reputation. However, those ‘brick and mortar’ universities may be the most ill-equipped in times of current crisis; giving way to newer universities to gain in repute, and for a share of business. The latter incidentally may be more flexible and better equipped in offering cheaper solutions, in the form of online education.
The case of online education is tricky for architectural training, as most design (studio) courses require some form of residency component -computing a large part of the course requirement, which is now hindering the progress of academic pursuit. Additionally, not all faculties, departments and staff are equipped to shift to online and most have never dealt with this. Prior to this, universities have leveraged their budgetary allocations to build administrative support, parking services, residential dormitories, numerous buildings, and services -a whole lot of physical infrastructure that require an incredible amount of cash flow to sustain. In return, this adds to an impressive real estate that builds university repute, which attracts students to invest in specific product (course) offerings in return of certain lifestyles. Online education, principally offered by newer (and smaller) universities has operated differently over the past years, allowing a larger student enrolment over smaller campuses, rendering cheaper product offerings.
