Aging in Place: A National Student Design Competition

Sabra Harvey, Research Analyst

NAHB Research Center, in cooperation with the US Administration on Aging and the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture Fall 2002

Abstract

Aging in Place is a national student design competition focused on innovative, smart-aging residential design. Challenges to the student have included the design of new single and multi-family housing, and the creation of an urban community populated predominantly by older adults. Students who submit the winning entry receive a cash award as well as recognition at and a trip to the NAHB International Builders Show. The competition lends itself to inclusion within a one-semester curriculum.

Overview

The National Center for Seniors’ Housing Research (NCSHR) was established in the spring of 2000 as a cooperative effort between the NAHB Research Center and the U.S. Administration on Aging (AOA). As a result of this collaboration and as part of its total effort, NCSHR, in the summer of 2000, announced its first national student design competition, Aging in Place: A Smart-Aging Residential Design Competition for Students. The competition was structured in a manner to encourage student creativity and innovation in the development of new technologies for an aging population. Program materials were distributed, along with resource information targeted to housing, demographic, and consumer issues for older adults, and to the principles of universal design. By December sixty-three entries to the competition had been received from all over North America.

The competition was composed of two challenges. Individuals or teams of students could choose to submit designs for either a new, single-family home or for a new, multi-family community. The goal of the competition was, and remains, to solicit innovative ideas on smart-aging residential design. A jury of nationally recognized experts was convened and selected the most promising designs in early January 2001, basing the decision on creativity, buildability, livability, and affordability. All entries were then featured at an open house at the NAHB Research Center in Upper Marlboro, Maryland. Cash awards and an invitation to the 2001 NAHB International Builders’ Show, gave the winning students an opportunity to meet builders, manufacturers, and other housing industry specialists.

Participants

Students enrolled in post-secondary schools of architecture, building construction programs, and other relevant schools and departments were invited to participate in the competition. Although most of the students came from schools of architecture, planning and construction engineering, and technology schools, the competition was able to reach students from a variety of disciplines. Health and occupational therapy, landscape architecture, universal design, and environmental design students participated as well. A faculty sponsor worked with each individual or team and often incorporated the competition challenge and universal design into the semester’s curriculum.

Ongoing Effort

Because of the success of the first competition, NCSHR has made Aging in Place an annual event. The fall 2001 event again featured two challenges for the students. The first was to design a new, single-family home; the second challenge involved renovating a group of urban rowhouses. Opening the competition to a wider range of solutions, the fall 2002 Aging in Place challenge was to develop a community on a ten acre urban site of the student’s choosing, taking into consideration that a large segment of the population was expected to be individuals aged 55 and older. As in the initial competition, the students’ challenge has continued to be the solicitation of innovative, smart-aging residential design.

Part of the total competition concept has been to make information from the designs available to a larger audience. Electronic virtual tours are created from the winning designs each year, and a booklet highlighting particularly innovative and useful design features is published. The virtual tours are accessible on the NAHB Research Center web site at www.nahbrc.org; the booklet, Spotlight on Ideas, is available upon request from the NAHB Research Center.

“...there is no more effective instrument for disseminating ideas to a broad public audience. A design competition engages people to contemplate change, including changes in their own points of view.”

“Who Gets It?” - New York Times May 18, 2003 HERBERT MUSCHAMP

FALL 2003 While the NAHB Research Center will not sponsor a competition for the fall 2003 semester, the staff is committed to the Aging in Place concept, and development continues for the next competition.

Audience characteristics and size: Post-secondary students enrolled in schools of architecture and related programs, including occupational therapy and interior design

Educational value: Encourages student creativity and innovation in the development of new technologies for an aging population

Objectives

To gain new ideas from fresh minds not yet impressed by the building industry; to expand student awareness of aging in place issues and the relationship those issues have to universal design principles

Context: Developed in conjunction with a cooperative agreement with the US Administration on Aging

For more information, contact Sabra Harvey at sharvey@nahbrc.org.

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Citation: Harvey, Sabra (2003). Aging in Place: A National Student Design Competition. © NAHB Research Center. Retrieved (Enter Date), from Universal Design Education Online web site: http://www.udeducation.org/teach/shortevents/competitions/harvey.asp