This is a vertical elective combining students in their fourth and fifth year of the BArch program with students from the architecture graduate programs. The content of the elective options varies from year to year, and covers advanced topics that invite critical thinking and innovation in the area of urbanism.Section Description: Students in this seminar will experiment with inventive techniques of public engagement that can empower activism in the housing justice movement. For many decades, architects and urban designers have used surveys, post-it notes, town hall meetings, and collaborative design sessions to fold public opinion into their designs. However, this work–often called public engagement or participatory design practice–is also criticized for creating the mere impression of community consultation without meaningfully sharing power or enabling systemic change. Instead, this course advocates for a shift in the focus of public engagement to the creation of collective power. We will learn how to build decision-making tools that support community activists’ ability to envision systemic change in the housing system. We will work in partnership with SOMOS Mayfair, a nonprofit organization based in the Mayfair neighborhood of East San Jose, which organizes tenants and working-class families to create alternative housing solutions. SOMOS has asked us to design and fabricate a physical board game for their constituents that will inform the creation of a Limited Equity Cooperative (LEC)--a kind of cooperatively-owned housing project that can guarantee long-term affordability. Our objective is to help members play out potential scenarios that will emerge in the life of the LEC and, in the process, enable a lively, open, and generative conversation that will inform the creation of this ambitious project. This course will consist of two main parts. In seminar sessions, we will hold reading discussions and discuss case study projects. We will take a close and critical look at the legacy of public engagement in architectural and urban design, and we will explore cooperative housing ownership in relation to questions of social and racial justice. In workshop sessions, we will work in teams (and sub-groups) to imagine, iterate, test, and build the game. We will visit San Jose and engage in a collaborative process with SOMOS Mayfair representatives. We will also build skills in verbal, written, and graphic communication with a public audience. Together, these experiences will equip students to engage in future architectural design practice that can support community partners in pursuing deep-seated change.

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