Mission Statement

To cultivate in our students independent thinking within an ethical framework that informs and challenges the contemporary practice of architecture through teaching, research, and service. To provide a professional education that intertwines the spatial, visual, technical, and conceptual content of architecture, and graduates students to think synthetically, act fearlessly, understand practice as research, and make a regenerative contribution to the world.

Vision Statement

The architectural inquiry of both faculty and students is grounded in the cultural, phenomenal, and material world. Our work engages the cultural richness of people and communities, the sensuous qualities of architecture, and the physical and ecological realities of making. Balanced between space making and form making, we anchor our work in our place and time, seeing the extraordinary and provocative qualities of our region as significant resources for architectural creation.

In support of this, the School is dedicated to:

Intellectual discipline. The School guides students to engage in self-directed, self-motivated, and logical design research. Faculty and students are committed to developing methods of inquiry that lead to integrated and cohesive designs, engaging the wider world through field trips, exchange programs, and guest lecturers.

Deliberative making. The School requires an iterative physical understanding of how things occupy space, make space, and operate in the larger world. Through making and evaluating things that are, students learn how to make architectural proposals for things that could be.

Integrated thinking. The School encourages collaboration with other disciplines and promotes open discourse within the discipline as models for the practice of architecture. Students consider systemic interrelationships of scale in architectural design, from the macro-scale of global design to the micro-scale of the architectural detail.

Ethical action. The School's outreach centers are committed to serving Mississippi communities and providing models for responsible practice that integrate with teaching and research.

Above all, we understand design to be a deeply considered artistic endeavor. The School emphasizes the delight of architecture and the search for the indefinable artistic spark that enlivens the things we make.