Shadow Mentor Day 2018
As part of UO’s shadow mentor day, Mark Young hosted Paul Turner, a first-year undergraduate in the architecture department. The mentor day pairs students with professionals throughout Eugene, Portland, and Seattle. Students experience a “day in the life” or an actual work day in an actual work setting. At Rowell Brokaw, Mark walked Paul through some of his current projects, including Tykeson Hall. After sitting in on an engineering meeting with PAE, Paul circulated around the office to understand the range of work and experience other roles and perspectives. He also donned a headset and walked through RB's future office at 1203 Willamette. We hope Paul will come visit us again when we are in an intentional office rather than an inherited one. We also hope he got a sense of our office culture, which we think of as informal and passionate. At the end of his visit, Paul asked Mark some provocative questions:
P: What would you say to your younger self?
M: It’s a badge of honor for architecture students to say how much they’ve stayed up and worked, but when you’re in the profession and you have families, you learn to be more efficient while doing better quality work. You get more experience and you learn how to manage your time and thoughts more constructively. It makes sense when you’re starting out that you don’t know what you need to have and more always seems better. And there still is this weird architecture culture, this rite of passage, that permeates through school and some offices. You do have to be hardworking to be an architect; it’s not always 9-5. If there’s a thing to do, you do it. And you're willing to do it because you like your work. But the sweatshop mentality of "the more the better" is often a result of just not being smart with your time. It takes experience. It’s perfectly excusable until you’ve done projects and you know what it takes to deliver a project.
P: What does it take to be an architect?
M: Stay curious and interested. Be open to new ideas and learning.