Architecture, Interior Design, and Construction Management

Tracking student progress toward program completion and transfer in the Architecture, Interior Design, and Construction Management program areas is a complex proposal. This document provides descriptive statistics of enrollments, measures of progress, completion, and transfer for students attempting courses in any of the three areas. Because of shared core courses in the three area program requirements and changing program requirements over the 10 year period of analysis, each area may have inconsistent results not clearly designated as requirement changes, or course transformations.

Enrollments and Pass Rates

Enrollments in Architecture courses (includes Design 101) steadily increased between 2000-1 and 2006-7 and peaked in the 2007-2008 academic year. The growth averaged 8% per year until 2006-7 where it has remained stable at just over 1600 attempted enrollments as can be seen in Figure 1.

Figure 1. Enrollments in courses with ARCH as a subject* from summer 2000 through spring 2010 by academic year.

Note: Passed includes enrollments with a final grade of A-C, CR, and P.
*Note: Includes DSGN 101.

While the percentage of students passing courses in Architecture peaked in 2004-5 and 2005-6 at 74%, the pass rate has been consistently between 70% and 74% for the past 10 years. Table 1 shows the pass rates for the three program areas by subject area. Unlike the high enrollment Architecture courses, the somewhat low enrollment

Table 1. Pass Rates of Architecture, Interior Design, and Construction Management courses by Subject Area.

2000-1 / 2001-2 / 2002-3 / 2003-4 / 2004-5 / 2005-6 / 2006-7 / 2007-8 / 2008-9 / 2009-10
Arch / 70% / 70% / 71% / 71% / 74% / 74% / 73% / 71% / 72% / 72%
Int Design / 64% / 75% / 56% / 46% / 54% / 63% / 66%
CM / 63% / 61% / 70%

Interior Design and Construction Management courses, unique to those programs, have much more variance in pass rates as shown in Table 1 due to the small numbers. The range of pass rates in the Interior Design courses range from a low of 46% up to 75% as the high. However, the overall pass rates of Interior Design, as shown in Table 1, have consistently increased since the low in 2006-7 to a high of 66%.

The courses included that are specific to Interior Design (as designated by either subject or course identifier) have a subject of “INTD” or a course identifier of DSGN110 or DSGN150 for the purposes of the charts and tables that follow. Shared core courses will be addressed specifically later in the document. With that criteria, only one course with INTD as a subject appeared in the data since 2000-1 and that course was INTD 138. And, it only occurred sporadically as shown in Table 2. Courses included in the tables for Construction Management include only those courses with the subject of “CM”.

Figure 2. Enrollments in courses unique to Interior Design from 2003-4 through 2009-10 by academic year.

Clearly the sporadic nature of enrollments in the Design 150 and Interior Design 138 courses, impact the pass rate of those courses as a group as shown in Figure 2 and Tables 1 and 2.

Table 2. Pass Rates and Enrollments in Courses Unique to Interior Design from 2003-4 through 2009-10 by Course and Academic Year.

2003-4 / 2004-5 / 2005-6 / 2006-7 / 2007-8 / 2008-9 / 2009-10
Course / Passed / Enroll / Passed / Enroll / Passed / Enroll / Passed / Enroll / Passed / Enroll / Passed / Enroll / Passed / Enroll
DSGN110 / 64% / 11 / 72% / 25 / 56% / 45 / 46% / 56 / 54% / 24 / 69% / 29 / 65% / 52
DSGN150 / 86% / 7 / 62% / 29
INTD138 / 55% / 20 / 68% / 28


Recent efforts to enforce prerequisites have also created a change of student enrollment behavior. Table 3 shows the pass rates for courses taken in the first semester students enrolled in an Architecture course.

19

Architecture, Interior Design, and Construction Management


Table 3. Student Architecture Course Pass Rates in the First Semester students took an Architecture Course (includes DSGN101)

2005-6 / 2006-7 / 2007-8 / 2008-9 / 2009-10
Course / Not
Pass / Pass / Enrolled / Not
Pass / Pass / Enrolled / Not
Pass / Pass / Enrolled / Not
Pass / Pass / Enrolled / Not
Pass / Pass / Enrolled
ARCH18A / 43% / 58% / 40 / 45% / 55% / 80 / 47% / 53% / 55 / 40% / 60% / 20 / 0
ARCH18B / 40% / 60% / 40 / 39% / 61% / 46 / 42% / 58% / 48 / 35% / 65% / 75 / 46% / 54% / 63
ARCH20 / 23% / 77% / 126 / 35% / 65% / 108 / 31% / 69% / 117 / 35% / 65% / 103 / 26% / 74% / 104
DSGN101 / 40% / 60% / 40 / 39% / 61% / 72 / 41% / 59% / 160 / 33% / 67% / 166 / 26% / 74% / 291
ARCH21 / 43% / 57% / 100 / 34% / 66% / 82 / 50% / 50% / 10 / 17% / 83% / 6 / 50% / 50% / 6
ARCH22A / 33% / 67% / 12 / 20% / 80% / 10 / 100% / 4 / 30% / 70% / 10 / 100% / 8
ARCH22B / 0 / 100% / 1 / 0 / 0 / 0
ARCH23 / 50% / 50% / 24 / 34% / 66% / 44 / 43% / 57% / 28 / 27% / 73% / 30 / 29% / 71% / 45
ARCH24 / 50% / 50% / 2 / 100% / 1 / 100% / 1 / 0 / 100% / 2
ARCH240 / 0 / 0 / 30% / 70% / 10 / 29% / 71% / 14 / 44% / 56% / 16
ARCH27 / 100% / 9 / 33% / 67% / 6 / 67% / 33% / 3 / 45% / 55% / 11 / 63% / 38% / 8
ARCH29A / 29% / 71% / 141 / 30% / 70% / 152 / 26% / 74% / 165 / 21% / 79% / 140 / 29% / 71% / 129
ARCH30A / 100% / 1 / 0 / 100% / 2 / 0 / 0
ARCH30B / 0 / 0 / 100% / 1 / 0 / 100% / 1
ARCH31A / 32% / 68% / 19 / 15% / 85% / 13 / 35% / 65% / 23 / 17% / 83% / 18 / 27% / 73% / 22
ARCH31B / 40% / 60% / 15 / 13% / 88% / 16 / 27% / 73% / 11 / 45% / 55% / 11 / 20% / 80% / 30
ARCH32 / 10% / 90% / 10 / 100% / 16 / 46% / 54% / 13 / 17% / 83% / 6 / 33% / 67% / 15
ARCH34 / 46% / 54% / 13 / 7% / 93% / 14 / 43% / 57% / 7 / 31% / 69% / 13 / 24% / 76% / 34
ARCH48 / 19% / 81% / 43 / 28% / 72% / 54 / 36% / 64% / 88 / 28% / 72% / 125 / 29% / 71% / 112
ARCH50 / 0 / 0 / 100% / 2 / 100% / 1 / 100% / 1
ARCH52A / 34% / 66% / 29 / 28% / 72% / 47 / 33% / 67% / 39 / 25% / 75% / 24 / 37% / 63% / 19
ARCH52B / 67% / 33% / 3 / 100% / 4 / 50% / 50% / 4 / 50% / 50% / 2 / 0
ARCH99 / 0 / 0 / 0 / 100% / 1 / 59% / 41% / 17
ARCH120F / 0 / 0 / 0 / 0 / 67% / 33% / 3
ARCH156 / 38% / 63% / 16 / 38% / 62% / 26 / 33% / 67% / 21 / 50% / 50% / 20 / 0
ARCH157 / 50% / 50% / 4 / 33% / 67% / 3 / 100% / 2 / 33% / 67% / 3 / 0
ARCH158 / 19% / 81% / 16 / 52% / 48% / 25 / 33% / 67% / 12 / 0 / 0
ARCH160 / 83% / 17% / 6 / 100% / 5 / 50% / 50% / 2 / 100% / 5 / 29% / 71% / 7

The introduction of Design 101 significantly impacted the first term enrollment behaviors and pass rates of students in ARCH 21 specifically. ARCH 48 has also increased in first term enrollments to a peak in 2008-9. While these patterns are impacted by pre-requisite requirements recently put in place, Table 4 shows the pass rates for those courses by year regardless of the regardless of the sequence in which students took the course.

Table 4. Pass Rates by Course for Architecture Courses from 2005-6 through Fall 2010

Note: Cells highlighted are below the average for the column.
Pass rates are below average for the dept. in ARCH 18A, 18B, 20 (except for FA 10), 21, 23, 27, 29A, 52A (except for FA 10), 99, 240, and DSGN 101.

19

Architecture, Interior Design, and Construction Management

Student progress

There are a number of possible measures of student progress. Although completing coursework in the major might seem to be the most obvious, the shared core courses of the Architecture and Interior Design majors as well as some in the advanced certificate for Construction Management, along with transfer curriculum within the major specific to the receiving institutions, make simple efforts to track students through requirements quite complex. Additionally, as is often the case with majors that are dominated by transfer oriented students, transfer curriculum often requires more general education than major specific coursework. With that in mind, a number of additional measures of progress such as persistence, two or more courses in the major, courses in major and transfer requirements, degree completion (including an examination of degree types), and actual transfer to two and four-year institutions will be presented. For the following analysis, students are classified into a cohort year by when they attempted and passed their first Architecture course. For example, if a student took their first Architecture course in Fall of 2003, then the student would be tracked in the 2003-4 cohort group.

The number of students passing at least two courses in the Architecture program area, who persisted to accumulate 6 or more units in Architecture, are shown in Table 5. The first cumulative units column shows the percent of students who earn at least 6 and less than 9 units in Architecture. Over 60 percent of students passing at least 6 units in Architecture went on to successfully (grade of A-C, CR) complete 9 or more units in 2.5 years or more and over 48% earned 12 or more units in Architecture within 3.5 years. Given the increased pass rates in DSGN 101 over the last few years, these numbers should increase as those students accumulate more units. Clearly the compressed time for the most recent three cohort groups limits the unit accumulation for those groups. Even greater persistence occurred for those students who persisted to at least 9 units. Between 75% and 80% of students with 9 or more units accumulated 12 or more units (e.g., 48.3%/60.1%).

Table 5. Students completing six or more units in Architecture by total Architecture units accumulated by academic year of the student’s first attempt of an Architectural course.

Cumulative Units Earned*
Year of First Arch Course / Students with 6+ Units / 6-8.9 / 9-11.9 / 12-23.9 / 24+ / Earned 9+ / Earned 12+ / Years Available
2005-6 / 143 / 39.9% / 11.9% / 28.0% / 20.3% / 60.1% / 48.3% / 5.5
2006-7 / 159 / 30.8% / 15.7% / 37.1% / 16.4% / 69.2% / 53.5% / 4.5
2007-8 / 133 / 35.3% / 16.5% / 28.6% / 19.5% / 64.7% / 48.1% / 3.5
2008-9 / 118 / 39.0% / 19.5% / 33.1% / 8.5% / 61.0% / 41.5% / 2.5
2009-10 / 115 / 54.8% / 20.9% / 23.5% / 0.9% / 45.2% / 24.3% / 1.5
2010-11 / 10 / 90.0% / 10.0% / 0.0% / 0.0% / 10.0% / 0.0% / .5
Total N / 678

*Note: Students are categorized by the number of units accumulated over the total number of years available for analysis. Architecture courses include only courses with subject of “ARCH” or the course “DSGN101.”


Student persistence can also be measured over time. Table 6 shows the number of terms students who earned at least six units in Architecture continued to return and accumulated Architecture units. Of students earning six or more Architecture units, between 10-16% attempted Architecture courses for only a semester. Between 85-90% of students persisted for two or more semesters and between 68-76% took Architecture courses for three or more terms. While between 11-15% took six or more terms of Architecture courses, the high percentage accumulating 12+ units, from Table 5, probably did so within 5 terms of course taking.

Table 6. Students completing six or more units in Architecture by the number of terms the student persisted taking Architectural course (includes DSGN 101).

Year of First Arch Course / Students with 6+ Units / Number of Terms Persisting*
1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7+
2005-6 / 143 / 14.0% / 27.3% / 20.3% / 11.2% / 14.0% / 5.6% / 7.7%
2006-7 / 159 / 15.7% / 25.2% / 20.8% / 17.0% / 10.7% / 6.9% / 3.8%
2007-8 / 133 / 13.5% / 24.1% / 18.8% / 16.5% / 12.0% / 13.5% / 1.5%
2008-9 / 118 / 10.2% / 32.2% / 23.7% / 27.1% / 5.9% / 0.8%
2009-10 / 115 / 12.2% / 67.8% / 18.3% / 1.7%
Fall 2010 / 10 / 100.0%
Grand Total / 678 / 99 / 227 / 136 / 99 / 60 / 38 / 19

*Note: Terms may not be consecutive.

Pathways in Architecture
There are a number of pathways that students can take in the Architecture program. If we look at the catalog and use the courses in Architecture that are required for an associate degree in the major, as shown in Table 7, it becomes evident that the majority of students represented in the prior tables (5 & 6), are not following the catalog sequence, although a few eventually pass all the courses. The fewest sets of courses taken and passed are those in the second and fourth semester. While nearly half of the students completing first semester courses completed third semester courses, less than a quarter of them completed second semester courses and only one or two would complete the fourth semester courses.

Table 7. Students passing all required Architecture courses specified in the catalog for the architectural associate degree by semester and year of First Architecture course.

Semester
First Arch / First / Second / Third / Fourth
2000-1 / 24 / 8 / 11 / 2
2001-2 / 31 / 13 / 20 / 3
2002-3 / 29 / 9 / 16 / 4
2003-4 / 36 / 12 / 26 / 1
2004-5 / 41 / 9 / 22 / 2
2005-6 / 42 / 10 / 17 / 2
2006-7 / 52 / 12 / 16 / 2
2007-8 / 56 / 8 / 9
2008-9 / 47 / 6 / 3
2009-10 / 41 / 2

Note: See Table 8 for actual required courses.

Table 8 displays the list of Architecture Major courses from the 2010 catalog that students may be using as a guide until they become more informed by the faculty in the department.

Table 8. Architecture Major Courses (Architecture courses only) in the College Catalog


First Semester (Fall) Units

ARCH 48 Intro to Architecture, Construction & Design 1

ARCH 20 Orthographic Projection 3

ARCH 29A Freehand Drawing 1

Second Semester (spring)

DSGN 101 Design Fundamentals 3

ARCH 22A Delineation & Rendering 3