The Architecture Foundation of Oregon (AFO) recruits professionals from the building community (architects, engineers, contractors, and more) and matches them with 3rd-5th grade Oregon teachers in their geographic area. Together, they choose lessons from a curriculum guide and create a unique and engaging experience that introduces students to the basic principles of design. Architects in Schools is offered free of charge to schools.
After 10+ years of participating in the local Architects in Schools program, DEI principal Brian Dunagan passed the torch to his daughter Sara Dunagan Day, DEI draftsperson. This was a natural transition because before joining DEI in 2023, Sara taught high school math—in Houston for two years and South Medford for three years. Sara moved from Texas back to Oregon when the pandemic hit, and started teaching at South Medford. When she needed a break from teaching, DEI hired her as a draftsperson.
“Honestly, I've been loving it,” Sara exclaimed. “I don't know if I will return to teaching anytime soon because this has been so enjoyable. I love working as a draftsperson, and having a math background is extremely useful. It helps with a lot of the three-dimensional thinking and figuring out if things make sense. It's not necessarily that I'm doing a lot of math. But I’m using those critical thinking skills from the math.”
The Architects in Schools program is administered by the Architecture Foundation of Oregon. They get design professionals—architects, engineers, draftspersons, and others connected to the building industry—and pair them up with teachers in their local area.
Sara, assigned to a 3rd-grade class at Bellevue Elementary School in Ashland, explained, “You go into the classroom once a week for six weeks, teach kids something about the industry, and have them do a little project based on what they learned." Sara’s lessons were about designing bridges.
“I taught them a lot about how the forces of bridges work together to hold the structures up. And we did activities to help them understand how those forces work in the real world,” Sara explained. “I wanted them to connect what we learned in the classroom to what they see when driving down the road. Each time we met, there were two or three concepts and associated activities. The last three sessions were spent with them building their own bridges, and then we tested their strength—for example, how many books we could put on top of them.”
Sara says she’d like to continue with the program with either the same teacher or a class of older students—maybe 5th graders so she could teach some more complex concepts. Either way, Sara is continuing the DEI tradition of working with young students to help give them an appreciation for the design and construction industry and show them potential career paths for themselves.
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