Schools of Architecture in Nigeria

SCHOOLS OF ARCHITECTURE IN NIGERIA

Written by

OLUBANWO, GBOLAHAN ADEOLA.

ARC/98/1050

COURSE; RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

(ARC 805)

LECTURE; PROF.O.O.OGUNSOTE

APRIL, 2008.

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TABLE OF CONTENT

TABLE OF CONTENT i

ABSTRACT ii

LIST OF PLATES iii

1.1 INTRODUCTION 1

1.2 HISTORICAL REVIEW 2

1.3 SCHOOLS OF ARCHITECTURE AND CURRICULAR 3

1.4 NATIONAL UNIVERSITY COMMISSION AND THE SCHOOLS 6

2.0 FEDERAL UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY, AKURE. 9

2.1 PHILOSOPHY AND PROGRAMMEE 9

2.2 ADMISSION REQUIREMENT 9

2.3 DURATION OF PROGRAMME 10

2.4 REQUIREMENTS FOR GRADUATION 10

3.0 UNIVERSITY OF LAGOS 11

3.1 PHILOSOPHY AND PROGRAMME 11

3.2 OBJECTIVES OF THE PROGRAMME 11

CHAPTER FOUR 13

4.0 FEDERAL UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY, YOLA 13

4.1 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND 13

4.2 PHILOSOPHY AND PROGRAMME 13

CHAPTER FIVE 15

5.1 RECOMMENDATION 15

5.2 CONCLUSION 15

References 16

ABSTRACT

This report looks at schools of architecture in Nigeria. It examines its historical development, and its relevance to Nigeria’s national needs. The report asserts that the curriculum of architectural education in Nigeria has over the years, been developed in relation with local conditions with due emphasis placed on national needs and aspirations. The report asserts that architecture plays a critical role in improving the quality of the built environment, and thus schools of architecture has a definite role to play in its achievement. It further asserts that due to rapid urbanization in Nigeria, the quality of the environment has been grievously vitiated. This requires major shifts in areas of emphasis of the curriculum in equipping students with necessary skills and knowledge to resolve the environmental problems emerging in the country.

LIST OF PLATES

1.1.4 Table: Degree-awarding schools of architecture in Nigeria

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CHAPTER ONE

1.1 INTRODUCTION

Architectural education began in Nigeria in 1952. The Nigerian College of Arts, Science and Technology was the first school of architecture, graduated its first set of students in 1961. The graduates were awarded Diploma in architecture, which exempted them from Parts II of RIBA (Royal Institute of British Architects) examination, and it permitted them to take the final examination. In 1962, the College was upgraded into a University and the programme was restructured for the award of Bachelor of Architecture. This period (1952-1962) is the first of three distinguishable periods of architectural education in Nigeria (Uji, 2001). The only school of architecture in Nigeria then was established and run by the British and later formed the faculty. Schools of architecture came on stream between 1963 and 1979. In these periods, architects from Eastern and Western Europe dominated the faculty of the schools. This is the second period of architectural education in Nigeria, which Uji (2001) referred to as the

Semi-colonial period of experimentation. Since 1979, fourteen schools of architecture have been established in the country with the faculty dominated by Nigerians.

The curriculum of schools of Architecture in Nigeria has in the three periods been a subject of critical debate in several fora on its continued relevant to Nigeria’s national needs. Its historical background as a curriculum modeled after the British and /or American pattern and thus the Beaux-Arts tradition, has generated calls for review to meet local yearnings and needs, and social and cultural exigencies. The growth of architectural education in the country in its fifty years of existence has witnessed the development of various ideas, and philosophies by the different schools of architecture in their efforts to making architectural education reflect local and national aspiration. The schools of architecture are however guided in their programme design by the general framework provided by the National Universities Commission (NUC) in the country.

1.2 HISTORICAL REVIEW

The establishment of the Nigeria College of Arts, Science and Technology in 1952 led to the birth of architectural education in Nigeria. The college was located at Ibadan, the capital of the then Western Region of Nigeria. It was relocated to Zaria in Northern Nigeria in 1955. The first set of Diploma students graduated in 1961.In 1962, the college was upgraded to a full-fledged University, named Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. The course programme was restructured and graduates were awarded the Bachelor of Architecture degree, which had the same link as the earlier Diploma with RIBA. The link with RIBA was maintained until 1968, when the course programme was again restructured, into two-tier, with the offer of the Bachelor of Science (B.Sc) and Master of Science (M.Sc) degrees in architecture. The new programme took off in 1969.

The University of Nigeria, which came into existence in 1962, established a department of architecture in 1963. The new department became the second school of architecture in Nigeria. In 1970, a third school of architecture was established in the University of Lagos. At the turn of the century in 1999, the number of degree-awarding institutions in Nigeria had risen to sixteen (ten Federal and six State Universities). There were also nineteen Polytechnics and Colleges of Technology awarding National Diploma (ND) and/or the Higher National Diploma (HND) (Arayela, 2000). Two state universities (Kano and Ogun) and a private institution (Covenant University) have since established three additional degree-awarding schools of architecture.

1.3 SCHOOLS OF ARCHITECTURE AND CURRICULAR

Quality of the human habitat is central to architecture, and thus the goal of architectural education is to contribute to the attainment of a humane and responsive environment. In this, schools of architecture strive to equip students with the education required to make them contribute to the promotion of an orderly development of the human environment. The programme of study leads to the production of professionals who are sensitive to human needs and aspirations and who have the requisite knowledge and the intellectual and aesthetic skills to evolve expressive design solutions of problems of the built environment. They have the professional skills required for effective shaping, reordering and articulation of the built environment.

The goal of architectural education is subsumed in the general concept of education, which is to prepare people to improve and perpetuate their society. This is achieved by taking due cognizance of the society’s political, social and economic circumstances in the design of the educational programme.

Architectural programme in Nigeria was designed, at the onset, to meet the challenges of modern architecture. The programme has faced challenges in the last fifty years for it to be relevant to Nigeria’s national needs and aspirations, as well as meet current technological developments (Olotuah, 2000). Adeyinka (1981) has succinctly shown that education must be consciously enlisted to serve national needs, and indeed education is an instrument of power on which national survival depends.

The objectives of the educational programmes in Nigeria, as stipulated in the third National Development Plan provide a general framework within which architectural education in Nigeria is focused. These include (FGN, 1975):

(i)  Reforming the content of general education to make it more responsive to the

Socio-economic needs of the country;

(ii)  Consolidating and developing the nation’s system of higher education in response to the economy’s manpower needs;

(iii)  Rationalizing the financing of education with a view to making the educational system more adequate and efficient; and

(iv)  Making an impact in the area of technological education to meet the growing needs of the economy.

The objectives of architectural education in Nigeria largely reflect this national aspiration. These objectives stress the importance of research opportunities appropriate to the development of national resources and technological skills in meeting emerging national demands. The curriculum contents and specific subjects of study of schools of architecture in Nigeria are selected from the minimum standards stipulated by the country’s National Universities Commission (NUC). Each school of architecture draws its programmes from over a hundred different course titles. These courses are however categorized into seven instruction modules namely:

(i)  Architectural Design;

(ii)  Arts and Drawing;

(iii)  Historical and Theoretical Studies;

(iv)  Building Systems Technology;

(v)  Humanities and Social Studies;

(vi)  Environmental Control System; and

(vii)  Physical Sciences.

1.4 NATIONAL UNIVERSITY COMMISSION AND THE SCHOOLS

The NUC recommends the spread of these modules and their credit units over a 6-year period within a 2-tier structure. Greater emphasis is placed on the architectural design module than the other modules, and thus more than 40% of the required credits for the degrees are earned in the studio. This is informed by the centrality of the design studio to the entire architectural educational programme. The design studio is the hub and nucleus of the programme since all learnings in architecture are geared towards imparting into students skills they require in proffering solutions to problems of the built environment (Olotuah, 2000). The design studio is aimed at developing in students the awareness and skills they require in identifying architectural function, purpose, and meaning, later translated into appropriate designed settings. As the key integrative unit of the architecture programme, the design studio offers the unique opportunity of imparting cultural values into students and expanding the horizon of their world-view (Olotuah, 2002). Students have the opportunity to appreciate the great varieties of Nigerian traditional architecture, and their richness in content and form. Architectural schools have thus fostered national unity in spite of the nation’s immense diversity in the cultures of its people.

1.1.4 TABLE: DEGREE-AWARDING SCHOOLS OF ARCHITECTURE IN NIGERIA

s/n / Name of the university / year of establishment / ownership
1 / Ahmadu bello University, Zaria / 1952 / Federal government
2. / University of Nigeria, Enugu campus / 1963 / Federal government
3. / University of Lagos / 1970 / Federal government
4. / Obafemi Awolowo University, ile- ife / 1977 / Federal government
5 / University of Jos / 1979 / Federal government
6 / River State University of science technology / 1980 / State government
7 / Ambrose alli university, Ekpoma / 1981 / State government
8 / Abia state University, Uturu / 1982 / State government
9 / Enugu State University of science and technology, Enugu / 1985 / State government
10 / Federal University of Technology ,Minna / 1985 / Federal government
11 / Federal University of Technology, Akure / 1989 / Federal government
12 / Federal University of Technology, Yola / 1990 / Federal government
13 / Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, Bauchi / 1992 / Federal government
14 / Imo State University, Owerri / 1992 / State government
15 / Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomosho / 1993 / State government
16 / University of Uyo / 1995 / Federal government
17 / Kano state University, Kano / 2002 / State government
18 / Covenant University,Ota / 2002 / Private Owned
19 / Olabisi Onabanjo University ,Ago-iwoye / 2003 / State government

FIELD SURVEY: 2005.

CHAPTER TWO

2.0 FEDERAL UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY, AKURE.

2.1 PHILOSOPHY AND PROGRAMMEE

The overall philosophy of the training in department of architecture in FUTA is generally to produce a competent, skilled and versatile individuals capable of understanding society needs for shelter and translating this into climatologically and appropriately built environment; as well ensuring the capability of individual to face a broad spectrum of challenges of the environment for human and other activities. The graduate architects are trained to do the following:

·  Exploit the rich cultural and traditional architectural resources in the country in general, and within the immediate environment.

·  To appreciate the art and science of planning, design, erection, commissioning, maintenance, management and coordination of allied professional inputs in the development of environment.

·  To appreciate the changing needs for schools of architecture, arising from changing in social, economic, psychological and technological environment.

2.2 ADMISSION REQUIREMENT

English language, Mathematics, Physics AND ANY OF Chemistry, Geography or Technical Drawing. All undergraduate courses are normally five –years including one year of general science in school of science. Course lead to the award of Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech.) in Architecture. The professional degree in Architecture is not classified but may be offered with distinction in Design Thesis.

2.3 DURATION OF PROGRAMME

The programme of study includes a 5-section for B.Tech. (Architecture) and one and halve session for M.Tech.(Architecture), This however include a semester for Industrial Training period and an annual educational excursion/visit to important places of relevant architectural and environmental values during B.Tech.programme

2.4 REQUIREMENTS FOR GRADUATION

A student to qualify for an award of the degree shall be require to fulfill the general requirements of the University and pursue the course presented by the examiners in the course units shown in the curriculum. To pass 200, 300 and 400 levels, a student must pass the Design Studio. Compulsory core course deficiency may be carried into the next higher level, but this must be cleared before he or she can take the compulsory core course in the succeeding year. A candidate for degree must meet the minimum requirements of 200 units over the five years periods of study in the case of UME students and 157 units for Direct Entry students in addition, he or she shall complete prescribed field courses and a period of industrial attachment or practical training.

CHAPTER THREE

3.0 UNIVERSITY OF LAGOS

3.1 PHILOSOPHY AND PROGRAMME

The curriculum of the Department of Architecture is based on the philosophy that architectural works are primarily solutions to problems within resource envelopes rather than objects to be fashioned. The Architect, in this context, is seen as an “organization man” rather than an individualist and heroic designer. Accordingly he has to think and act comprehensively, more so than any other member of the environmental design team to create a total work which can be defined as an amalgam of intent, skill, technology, material, personal insight and special moment in time; in doing this, his basic tools are a set of clearly defined ends and an effective command of means plus the skill to achieve determine ends, in specific cases, aptly and economically in the design context agreed. While an architectural curriculum within the frame work of a formal educational system affords scope for the introduction and articulation of these ends and means, skills in their employment is expected to be perfected in the world of practice.

3.2 OBJECTIVES OF THE PROGRAMME

·  To prepare students for professional practice in the field of architecture. In this regard, emphasis is placed on understanding conceptual principles and patterns as well as on developing operational skills necessary for practice.