#357 - ‘The Value of Lifelong Learning in Architecture’, with Kevin Jones - Archispeak

Episode Transcript
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Evan Troxel (00:09):
Kevin, welcome to the Archispeak podcast.
Great to have you.

Kevin Jones (00:11):
Thank you.

We are going to be talking about continuing education, which
might be Cormac's favorite pastime.
I won't say it's your favoritesubject, but it might be your
favorite pastime, Cormac.
Am I am
I

Cormac Phalen (00:22):
It,

here?

it might be,

I

I have a strange addiction to them, but sure,

many CEs per week are you averaging?
Let's

I, I just, just, sat in on one today about two
hour rated duct work and stuff.
So, you not all find that riveting,

Yeah.
Is there like a profit sharingwhere you could share some of
those with me so that, you know,

you know, you know, it's funny is that.
Uh, what is it?
AIA only requires 18 per year with HSWs.
And my states, both Florida and Marylandrequire and Florida has the of having
a advanced code that you have to do.
And.

(01:06):
I'm well over those.
I think probably aboutlike March I was at 24.

Nice.

so yeah,

I think,

it, something's wrong with me.

yeah, I think Virginia's every two years I
need 16, something like that.
Um, it's not too bad actually.

reasonable.

it is.

kind of take a step back and frame this conversation around Continuing
education and the life of an architect.
And basically what this is, if you decideto get registered or licensed, depending
on the state, right, you do need tofulfill continuing education requirements.
Kevin, do you want to weigh in on justkind of the overall, just the framework

(01:46):
of this conversation that you, thatsomething that we want to put out front
so people understand what we're talkingabout and why we're talking about it?

Sure, yeah, I think the, I think for me, so I, so I teach
as well as I'm a sole practitionerand I, and I'm a full time.
Professor, you know, so for meeducation is hugely important.
It's sort of what I do, but at thesame time, I think the you know, that
it's not this box checking, which iswhat I end up doing half the time, sort

(02:14):
of right before something is due, youknow, or my license for Virginia, I
think is next year, I got to re up it.
So I'll be making sure Iget everything squared away.
I'm less good about keeping up sometimeswith my AIA yearly requirements,
you know, and maybe that's aninteresting thing to discuss too, is
the Each state requires something.
If you're in the AIA and you pay duesto the AIA, they require something.

(02:35):
There's overlap, but then there's not,if you've got multiple licenses like
Cormac assigns, like you do, you know,then there's this sort of spreadsheet
complexity of what have I done?

Yeah.

We need

Yeah, yeah.
You know, and then at what point doesthat miss the forest for the trees?
Maybe of, you know, that what could yoube learning if you were more focused
on expanding your horizons than juston like, oh my God, my spreadsheet
says I need two more next week.
So I think that that's maybe agood starting point or a framework.
You know, I think for me, you know,my, I worked for 11 years for a

(03:10):
small seven to 10 person firm.
Then I, Merged in with a bigger firmfor two years and I came now I'm
teaching and I'm a sole practitioner.
So for me actually now getting the, CEUsand things, it's pretty hard because
vendors don't come to my house with, with,with, um, two hour rated wall assemblies
and sit in my kitchen and givepresentations and, um, you know,
I can count some of the teachingand things that I do here.

(03:32):
I routinely give code lectures andthose kinds of things to my students.
and I'm also sort of in the middleof nowhere, away from cities.
So, sometimes accessing, sortof good continuing education.
So, this like, the differing requirementsand maybe questions of access are good,
good places to, to, to jump off from.

and the, the, even another way to look at it.
I think from, from this conversations,the angle of this would be.
Is it difference between using itfor career advancement and, you know,
strategic outcomes on projects or careerthings versus it a chore or something
you need to fulfill last minute, right?

(04:09):
Because there

right,

which everybody knows architects can't do
anything

Yeah.

right?
So these deadlines exist for goodreason and they work for in that way.
Um, and then, and then there's justkind of this component of, you know,
honor system that goes with it all.
I

basically.

Right.

are like certificates, but then you are required to basically
catalog those things and keep themin case, at least in the states
where I'm licensed, I, there's justrandom audits that happen in it.
And

Yeah,

happens, like
every,

Yeah.

when you, when you send the check in to redo your license to renew it.
a checkbox that says, Ihave completed the, the,

Right.

and so you agree by and you're basically, you know, signing your
life away at that point saying, yeah,

right,

system, I've done this, but, but then they could audit you
and then you would have to show thatyou actually did that every time.
So, and I'm, I'm very much in the camp.
I'll just say it of, of last minute, like,um, it's, it's, I'm on the chore side.
Cormac is way more forwardthinking when, yeah.
When he's doing his or I,
he's
just

Yeah.

he's
not

Well, I can't, I can't,

Yeah.

I can honestly explain to you why I actually do what I do and
why I do it is because, so I work fora larger firm, and have for, really
since, uh, I stopped being a being a solepractitioner, in 2008, when, you know,
everybody in 2008 were sort of kickedin the hind quarters, as we would say.

(05:36):
and so one of the things that I did waskind of evolve into being a technical
resource for firms, specificallyprojects, being project architects,
senior project architect, project manager.
And of the way that, this particularfirm that I work for, and I've been
working for, for now, the past,10 years, we're part of, we, we've

(05:58):
developed, uh, this thing calledthe, technical excellence group.
And one of the things that we do isessentially try to maintain, document
standards, detail standards, andthings like that throughout the firm.
And with that, one of the things that wetry to do is stay on top of the technical
excellence design trends, material trends,manufacturing trends, detailing trends,

(06:19):
things like that, that basically we canuse to implement as, something that helps
support our, our design proficiency.
And honestly, a lot of that is moregeared towards that, you know, I mean,
not everybody wants to like, Just jumpon a, an hour long lunch and learn
that, was teaching about the fire set,you know, the, the fire rating of like

(06:42):
today, I, I sat on a fire rating for,for duct work and how that you could
minimize the shaft sizes by using, youknow, rated ducts and things like that.
And.
We do that because we want to talkabout getting like the design benefit,
you know, how much square footagecan we get back by reducing the
amount of like, you know, shaft walland, spaces and stuff that we would,

(07:05):
normally, do in a traditional method.
And it's things like that.
And that's really, honestly, one of thereasons why I do it the way that I do it.
There are some that honestly,oddly, you know, I'll say,
Ooh, that looks interesting.
And I will sit in anddo those just for fun.
But Like I said, I do it more foradvancement of knowledge so that when

(07:28):
somebody in the firm says, Hey, tryingto do a slab detail up against curtain
wall that needs X amount of rating I'mgoing to say, I know how to do that.
And here's a resource.
And we can talk about that and talkabout how it affects your design.
like that.
yeah.

you know, it has a ripple effect in the firm, maybe in
the profession, it touches clients,which touches projects, which touches
the communities that they sit in,
you know, so it's, I think it's,You know, maybe continuing education
gets more interesting if it canbe framed in a different way.
You know, and that's what this is, whatwe're talking about, right, is that
it's not this like, Oh God, I gottaeat my broccoli and take my medicine.

(08:12):
You know, that it's this, thissomething else that's this pursuit of
knowledge for, for different reasons.
You know, I think, um, you know, I workon less technically complex projects.
You know, I'm more inclined to pull upYouTube and watch a, a lecture by an
architect whose work I really enjoy,you know, as continuing education,
even though I don't file it for.
for, for credits, necessarily, becauseI can't really, but the, you know,

(08:35):
so that I'm, I'm inclined to sortof be watching, you know, the latest
Harvard lecture by, by someone whose,whose lecture I can't hear in person,
because I can't, I really want to bea better designer and to take those
things, those things in, so it's, arethere these opportunities to diversify
the kinds of continuing education?
Do they all have to betechnological or driven by economies

I mean, I, I honestly, I'll, I will try to run the gamut of
all sorts of different ones, technicaldesign oriented, history based, anything
that, know, the nerd side of me will seekout, like the architectural history and
the architectural design side of things,just because I want to sit and listen
to them learn about, things like that.

(09:20):
The, the, You know, doing the rightthing, by my firm is, sitting in and
learning how I can, better improvemyself technically, so that we can
improve our designs, both technicallyand, be able to support those designs.
But if you, if I showed a list ofall of my CEUs, and we can even
talk about like all the differentways that you can kind of track them.

(09:41):
I mean, you guys were talking about likeself reporting and I'm an AIA member,

Yeah,

of mine, as I punch them in,

yeah.

will, you know, send them to me and it directly reports to AIA.
So I don't have to gothrough that process.
Um, but it is funny as, you know, Evanwas saying is doing the honor system
of, when you are renewing your licenseat the state level, it's so baffles me
we don't just submit our required CEUso that we don't have to go through the

(10:12):
auditing process, which I've been auditedby the state of Florida several times.

really?

you, Florida.

Hmm.
It's

You guys,

Cormac.
It's random.

yeah,
you, you guys talk to a lot of people,you know, is there a sense that, like,
is this driven by individuals, youknow, sort of, Cormac, you're pursuing
this, the firm maybe supporting it, oryou're, you're creating these instruments
within the firm that support the largergroup, or is it, you know, are firms
sort of dictating, like, hey, we'regoing to have a culture of continuing
education here, you know, what's the,

for us, so I work for a firm, Air St.
Gross, and commonly referred to as ASG,and we've run this thing called the ASG
Academy, where we will do everythingfrom having our, weekly lunch and
learns, where anybody can get their CEU.
So at any given time, we're probablyaveraging about, you know, to

(11:02):
four, CEU opportunities per month.
Some of those then are also thingsthat we do for ourselves internally,
which are things like when we dogreen week, we will, internally have
like our sustainability director.
about, like, different kind of greeninitiatives, you know, how implementing,
these green initiatives within thedesign aspects, affect your design and

(11:23):
your spec writing and things like that.
And then, as part of, like, the TechnicalExcellence Group, we will, give lectures
or things throughout the firm that,talk about proper documentation or
proper detailing of certain things andthen, have just this constant knowledge
share, channel that we have thateverybody basically says, Hey, Evan.

(11:44):
Kevin, have you ever worked on a projectthat had this and then, have that
kind of knowledge sharing, effort.
So we do a, we make a veryconcerted effort to try to do
as much as the firm to get that.
So you don't have to go out and seek it.
Then I do the, the odd thing where,If it's like, say, architectural

(12:05):
newspaper or, ACE Lab or things likethat, those kind of things, I'll, do
a lot of continuing it through that.
And that's more just me.
I mean, when I was an NCARB member, NCARBwas a great resource, a great resource,
honestly, for some really good, CEUs.
And so those were justkind of like the things.
And, the good thing is, is thatit's that one, that one paid, for

(12:31):
the state of Florida, the typicallythat one paid, but it's only because
I wait to the last minute to getthat one where I have to pay for it.
the advanced code than that.
Most everything that I do is all free.
Like, I mean, there's, there'sjust so many different resources
out there for CEUs, manufacturers.
I mean, spec writing,services and stuff, do CEUs.

(12:53):
Some, I mean, there's CEUsthat you can find practically
anywhere for almost anything.
And, know, we were joking earlier beforewe started the call about Star Wars,
if I could find some, the architectureof Star Wars, I would be doing that.

is HSW approved.

yeah,

How to protect your vent shafts.

So, so I'm, I'm curious just from a, I mean, there's, there's like you
just mentioned, Cormac, there's differentavenues you can go through to CEUs.
You have a resource available toyou once a week, and that one is
just, it gets, it's on the schedule.
Somebody in
your

Right.

doing all of that kind of legwork to
schedule

hmm.

get those different, and they're usually
manufacturer driven, I assume,
right?

Oh, yeah, yeah.

creating the content, and that's the trade off, right?
Like, they get to get in front of youand tell you about their, their content.
There are building components,there are materials, um, and,
and

Yeah.

for that, you're getting an hour of education and probably
a free lunch to go with it, right?
And, and then there's the on demand, whichyou mentioned, NCARB, there's several
different vendors online that, that,

Yeah.

uh, On demand kind of ad hoc stuff.
And again, that's
usually

Mm hmm.

by building product manufacturers, right.
But there are other sources as well,so let's just talk about the difference
and Kevin, I'd love to hear yourperspective on this too, because I
think I'm more in a, in a similar boatto you where if, if I, when it comes to
crunch time for me, like I'm going tolook for the ones that are interesting
to me, whereas if you're in a firm,like you'd get what you get, right.

(14:29):
So,

yeah.

um, There's a, there's a little bit of a difference there
because rarely when somebody comesinto the firm to do a presentation,
does it have anything to do withwhat you're working on, right?
And if you're going out and lookingfor a CE course that you can apply
to your project, that might even be,You know, more useful in the moment.

(14:52):
And whereas these other ones you're kindof, okay, I'm going to file that away
for later, but to Cormac's point, likeI think one of the benefits to these
about this continuing education thingat all is you are actually learning
about things that will be useful, ifnot on your current project, probably
on your next or future project.
You know, not too far distant futureproject, because like, for example, if

(15:15):
you've always done rated shafts back toCormac's example, and now you can use
rated ductwork and actually save size,like, okay, I see the benefit there,
Right.

Right.

so it's like, we don't know these things until we know them.
Right?
And so
continuing, that's, that's to me, thereal purpose of continuing education is
to get this broader perspective that mayor may not apply to my current project,
but I'm going to tend more for lookingfor stuff that is more applicable to what
I'm working on or what is appealing to meversus maybe just what's on the docket.

(15:47):
So Kevin, what, what do you think?
Like, where do you fit into that?

I think I'm the same and maybe you said continuing education.
Maybe that's just education, right?
That this idea that can we expandour understanding of things and
horizons and you know, that maybeeducation is expansive, you know,
that it's, it should be wideningthe blinders, not narrowing them.
And I think, yeah, I was similar,you know, when I was in the larger
firm, you kind of got what yougot and you got a turkey club, um,

(16:11):
on a Wednesday and it was good.
Um, you know, might have hadthe cookie, might not have
had the cookie, um, but, uh.

always have the cookie.

Yeah, I, I have a few too many.
I'm cropped, but yeah, I'vehad cookies are my friend.
Um, but, uh, yeah, I think this abilityto maybe,, find more bespoke, sort of
interest in, you know, also, can it notjust be reactive, can it be proactive,
can you say, that's something interesting.
I want to go over there as opposed to,Evan this a little bit where you were

(16:41):
intumating, right, that, you This stuffmight be, it's going to be useful in
some way down the road, but, you know,is there a way through, by choosing the
options and making it more of an asset,less of a, less of a chore, like can you
position yourself in a different way?
Just like I, in college, might havetaken an elective or, you know, chosen
a second major or done a minor, out ofa sense that it might kind of open up

(17:02):
some other, Some other avenue or someother method of inquiry or, or just,
you know, pad, pad the resume, um,

Yeah.

you know, so yeah, I think for me it's this, you know, education
generally and continuing education forarchitects, you know, I try to think
about it, you know, can it, how can itadd to me, you know, help me at the desk
and, and it might be that that's notnecessarily just the technical things.
I think seeing an interesting designYou know, or, um, when I, I, I worked
in, lived in Richmond, Virginiafor 11 years, sort of between being

(17:33):
at Virginia Tech and coming back.
And we, I was part of a group that,um, it started as a, as an idea
with a local AIA chapter head.
And then a group of us sort of spun itoff and we were, let's say, AIA adjacent.
Um, but we were putting on these periodicthings that, it was really clever.
It was called Beer andDesign and it had two things.

(17:53):
I'll let you figure outwhich two things they are.
Um, You know, I think I still own beer.
Version 2.
0 will be cookies and design.
That'd be great.
But what we found, we were actually ableto invited speakers to come, we found
a brewery or someone willing to sortof host us and provide the beverages.

(18:14):
But it was, we were also drifting intothings that were architecture adjacent
or not even, so you'd get a bunch ofdesigners out, a hundred, on a Wednesday
night and they would come and heara tattoo artist and a guy who made
a camera out of a van, you know, andsomeone who started a community cycling
group for, uh, underserved communitykids, getting them on bikes from the
local, um, sort of housing authorityprojects, so it's, and, and all the

(18:36):
feedback after that from, from thepeople that, That I chatted with and my
peers were like, Oh, how great was that?
You know, it's like we, we sortof lived, eat, drink and breathe
architecture all the time.
That, you know, what happens when youintroduce something from a new direction?
Um, so I think that, that, those sorts ofthings that jump to my mind of, you know,
where you can start to pick and chooseand can you bring in your own agenda as

(18:58):
opposed to just kind of what's on thedocket or, or, um, again, like me cramming
like, you know, I got, what is available?
Yeah.
Does it cost anything or not?
You know, there's a series of reallyboilerplate metrics that, that sometimes
help me pick, you know, my CEUs.
Um, is it HSW or not?
So I think this ability to kind ofcustomize is, is an interesting,

(19:21):
way to think about this.
That it's less responding to whateveris available or what, what the
immediate needs of my project might be.
And then it might positionyou or the firm or the, or the
profession for something larger.
Yeah.

There's also, like you mentioned HSW there, I think
it would be good to kind of pointout what that means for those who
are unlicensed yet, just, I'm surepeople have seen that designation,
but maybe aren't clear what it means.
But there's other onestoo, like Cormac had

right.

advanced code for Florida.
California has zero net energyrequirements as long as well as
accessibility, units required.
because they further dial in the scopeof what is required for renewals, right?

Yeah.

think, you just said, you know, a couple of different
things that both California andFlorida require, and all of those are
HSWs, health, safety, and welfare.
And, you know, those are the ones thatare, primary requirements for us, um,
so that we are staying abreast of allof the latest trends in , both in, from
a code aspect, or, health aspect, youknow, whether it's, different trends

(20:21):
in, HVAC systems and things likethat and how you design around those
are basically all about, the health,safety and welfare of, the users of the
buildings that we're designing, right?
And then there's just the typical learningunits, which, know, HSWs are, but, not
all of the learning units are HSWs, you

Yeah.

could be just random things like, you know, going to a lecture
about, just recently went to a lecture,by BIG and, at University of Michigan.
And, they had a lecture.
opportunities for learningunits, but not HSWs,

Yeah.

you know, it's still one of those things that you're,
talking and, or listening to somebodywho's talking about, design trends or
things like that within the professionand, getting credit for them.
Right.
that's like the technicalaspect from my point of view,
Kevin, what are your thoughts?
I

not as familiar with the specialized ones for
like Florida and California.
Virginia doesn't have any specializedones, but yeah, I think sort of
HSW, Health, Safety, Welfare.
And in my experience, and you know,I sat on the local AIA board for a
number of years and was, went, I don'tknow if you guys have, have you been
on the, been on the AIA board or not?
Yeah.

not,
no.

the joke is the only way off the board is through it, you know, so you,
you sort of, so, you know, I moved, movedthrough, you know, President Elect and
all of those things, and I spent a year onthe State Board, you know, so especially
at the local level we were planning alot of these things and, I'm not sure
all HSWs are created equal, you have towrite four, write four points, they get
reviewed, you know, it's, it's, it'smaybe, Both useful that it's pretty broad

(21:59):
so many things can qualify that it's notso restrictive that that you're getting
just like one thing but also You know whenit's so broad What is it being covered?
I was just in thinking of preparingfor this today wondering about you
know Asking the kind of what ifquestions is like should there be other
frameworks for for these things shouldlike should I have to take three?

(22:21):
CDU's climate disaster units or,you know, should I have to take,
um, accessible equity based, justice basedenvironmental design kinds of credits.
that there's these other, youknow, the HSW like, so all HSW's
are LU's, not all LU's are HSW's.
Maybe within HSW's there should be.

(22:42):
Some additional levels of hierarchythat, that allow people to again, pick
and choose and then, but then also maybewe'd all be better for if we diversified
a little bit of what we were getting.

I totally agree with you.
I mean, cause there,you're absolutely right.
There's some that you're justlike, Howard, how is this an HSW?
and of course, like, We'll actuallyput in our email blasts to, to people
about like these lunch and learns,whether or not they're HSWs or not.
And of course, if they are, you'll geta higher turnout rate of people coming

(23:12):
because they need them versus like,

Yeah.

don't need any LE, know,

Yeah.

I just, I need the HSWs, you know, give me more of those,
give me my, you know, kind of thing.

All
24 that I have to do for Oregonare HSW and then California

yeah.

a, different set.
It's got the ZNE
and

Same.
Yeah.

So I unfortunately, I'm not
gonna

Well, I,

that Kevin mentioned

Right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
When

is one of the, the things that gets a little harder to track.
And it maybe with so many learning units,you could talk a little bit about this
and, and maybe you don't have to track'em because AI is tracking 'em, but
of the,

well, I, I, I, I, oh, you can't see it, sorry, but up to you.
I, I did log into my AIA accountto, to look at, all of the
different, LUs for the year
and, HSWs for the year.
And, um, yeah, I mean, there'slike the, the different, different
state requirements, um, that, youknow, I have, like you said, you

(24:09):
get 24 for each of the states.
You got, you know, a nice little,so I don't know where you were

yeah,

with that.

every type counts as a generic learning unit, but,
but
like

Yes.

everyone counts as a designated, like

Yes.

ZNE, um, accessibility, etc.
It's

You know,

out for.
I mean, that's
why I
think

Yeah.

out is because it's like, Oh, this is a little confusing if you don't
really pay attention to the designationseach course gets attributed to it so
that you can track these appropriately.
Because if you're not paying attentionat the end of the year, you will, you
will have to scramble to figure that out.

Yeah.

when we were planning events, you know, for AIA Blue
Ridge, which is our neck of the woodsdown here in Southwest Virginia.
You know, we'd be pretty.
Um, pre pandemic.
We were trying to maybe have one, Fridaya year where you could get five or
six, kind of in a day, you know, andwe'd tee them all up and then you'd
go through and you have to go in andapply, as the host of the event and the,

(25:10):
or the, the person sort of sponsoringthe, the credit to get it approved.
So, you know, we were always,volunteer based board scrambling
to just get the event going.
And then you're like.
You find out too late that it's five andone CEU and five HSWs because AIA didn't
approve something or you have to rewrite.
So it's, there's a lot of behindthe scenes on sort of those

(25:33):
credits, how they get certified.
The programs are good for two or threeyears, I think, and then they expire
and you have to re up them again.
So if you're hosting those thingsor you're putting them on, there's
a fair bit of, you know, kind ofbehind the scenes to make sure that
those things do qualify, that theydo achieve what people are expecting.
when they get their HSWor just a regular LU.

Yeah,

Cormac, your, your little wheel on the AIA app must
go around three times, you know, or

Uh, it, it probably does.

Yeah,

Yeah,

they're tracking your
steps
for

I've, I've, yeah, I've, I've done my, you know, I've done my
full steps for the year and then some.
and I was looking at just some of the,the one, the actual like transcripts
of, of some of the courses that I, havetaken and most of these are, basically,
as Evan kind of pointed out, somewhat,manufacturer-based, there are a few

(26:27):
design ones, but I mean, there arethings like, that are strictly things
about code or LEED or things like that,that, in my opinion, I think because
of the way that we should be designing,for best practices and stuff that a
lot of this, especially for AIA shouldbe more geared towards, kind of like

(26:48):
understanding best practices for a varietyof different things and not necessarily
be just, you know, AIA brought to you bywhatever, insert whatever manufacturer,
but actually teaching us how to designresponsibly, design to code, you know,
design universally through, the universaldesign and all of these other things.

(27:09):
And, because Kevin, I think I was, I wasliking where you were going with it's
just like, you know, there, there shouldbe like these little subsets of like,
okay, you can get all of these HSWs.
However, they need to fit like,these certain little things,
kind of like how we do, Yeah.
know, the way that we, acquire hours forthe ARE when we're acquiring AXP hours.

yeah,

there's certain level of ones that you should do, that you
should sort of keep refreshing yourselveson that throughout your career.
for some reason we just kind of,it's like, I could go through, you
know, to AIA Florida and sit througha two day course where I have it up
on one screen, put it on mute andthere and do whatever it is that you,

(27:50):
you do.
I'm not saying I do, trust me.

you don't.
Yeah.

I don't, I weirdly listen to them actually.
But, it is one of those things, likeyou as a, professor, know, you teach
certain things, you know, certainbasic knowledge, for architects, you
know, it's one of those things that youshould sort of refresh every often that
those CEUs should be almost required.

(28:15):
And I know I'm going off on atangent here, but, you know, it's
just one of those, wouldn't it bebetter if the CEUs actually meant
something other than box checking?

Well, I think one of the huge benefits of manufacturer CEUs
is

Yeah.

manufacturers know more about their world than
I

Oh, absolutely.

So

yeah.
Right,

is to get Up to speed on a subject that I can get in
that short period of time more sothan I can do anywhere else, right?
Like that, that is to me, the idealsituation is just, just establish
a personal relationship with theperson delivering the course.
So that, I say personal for, for thereason I'm about to get to, not this one.

(29:02):
The first one is just like, justtell me what I need to know about
your, like, what innovation is there?
What could I be doing better?
What are the best practices?
What do I need to know at the basic level?
But then I have a connectionwith a real person that
I

right,

when I actually need to apply it to a real project.
So I
feel
like

right, right.

potential, like, the right fit at the, it's usually not the right
fit at the right time, but it could be theright fit in creating a relationship for
somebody for when it is the right time.
I can, I can, uh, I can leverage that.

Totally agree with you.
Because I mean, one of the things isjust like, what are the opportunities
for influencing your design throughthe products that they're, wanting to
come and show you and talk about andhow it affects code and, how it affects
your design and things like that.
And again, you're right.
It may not affect it.
at the time, but it could be somethingthat you just keep in your mental

(29:56):
Rolodex of like, Oh, I remember that,this manufacturer has a solution
that's similar to what I'm looking for.
And now I've got that point ofcontact where I can go and utilize
them as the subject matter expertfor Y, or Z of what I'm trying to do.

Yeah, because things are changing all the
time
and

Oh, all the time.

all the changes in all the subjects.
And so I actually will rely on them to dothat because that's their thing, right?
So that, that's the benefit inthe relationship there for, for
that to

So, I, I, I have to say that one of the reasons why the
weird addiction of the CEUs happened
a set of specs, and I based it offof, because it was kind of some of
the first specs that I had to writefor large scale projects like this,
and listen to people who basicallysaid, Oh, you know, this, this

(30:50):
project's very similar to this project.
So why don't you just use thatset of specs and just, you know,
kind of like the header and footerand all of that other stuff.
So, sadly, I will admit to it that I did.
And, we submitted the document,got, started to get, bid RFIs back.
bidders were saying, hey, the specis outdated, this, manufacturer

(31:13):
or this product, are no longerin use or no longer in business.
what do you want to do?
And then I had to go back through andstart scurrying around to find other
products that, fit the same design orsacrifice design through just finding
that, second or third option, or theapproved equal, right, for something.
And it ended up being that without,having that, basic working knowledge

(31:38):
of like what products are out there.
When you start pulling together specs,you're just, you're, you're doing yourself
a disservice by, not understandingthe that are supporting your design,
and so I made a pact with myself thatthat's not going to happen again.
I'm not going to,

Hmm.

I mean the egg on my face.
from that was just like seriously Ijust put out a spec that like half
of not say half of but I mean likepeople were out of business and here
they are in my spec or this productis 20 years old and they've, contains
formaldehyde and you're like, uh, okay.

(32:13):
I'm not going to do that again.

Can I do that thing that professors do where we, like,
take the model and we turn it on end?
You know, on,
is, is, is there a downside to, youknow, I, I remember sort of being in
the office and sort of, but when I wasyoung, no one explained exactly Like
this person was coming and I got a freesandwich and I would and I would listen
to the two hour rated door thing andit took me a minute to figure out like

(32:36):
there was always that disclaimer youknow of like this is an approved thing.
I'm not talking about my products.

Yes,

Wink, you know, like
this this sort of like working the systemfrom both directions and of course like
yeah they are experts that doesn't meansomebody else wouldn't walk in with a
similar product and have a different.

Sure.

of things, you know, so that's this.
Yeah.
You know, not, not to say that I thinkeveryone, I try to operate from a
position of generosity that everyone'ssort of, you know, doing the right thing
and, and are good people, you know?
But this, you know.
That they are there to try to get theirproduct into the spec book, right?
Um, you know, you know, and that's, andI guess that we agree to play the game,

(33:15):
you know, it's like, because I wantto stay up to date, because I'm not an
expert on masonry wall systems as muchas I might like to think I am, right?
Um,

is well versed in

of course, yeah.

I wouldn't even say product, right?
Like,

fair.

I

Right.

makes more sense, right?
Because then it's lessbiased and it's like, well,

Yeah.

make the best product for Every scenario we
make

That's, yeah.

Yeah.

and that company makes the best product.
You should talk to them That'swhat I actually want to get out
of a product expert Right is

Yeah.

information because it's

Yeah.

it's not always applicable to what I'm doing But I

Exactly.

you to be the go to person right because

Yeah.

we

Right.

So I'm curious like something that you said both of you have
kind of alluded to kind of like thisYou Like, okay, Cormac, you're letting
it run two hours on the screen on mutewhile you're doing something else.
You not, not that you would do that.
Right.
And then, but there, there'sdefinitely like the way that
the materials get delivered.
So
there's

Yeah.
Yeah.

There's
on the

Yeah.

which is more kind of like, you know, some, you read a PowerPoint
and then you take a test kind of a thing.

Right.

let's talk about the good delivery.
Like what, what are, havebeen your favorite styles
of course, delivery and why?

Hmm.

Hmm.

I'm gonna let Kevin go first.

Yeah.
I was going to say the opposite.
Yeah, you first.
No, I mean, I think in person,you know, maybe just because we're
always more engaged in an in person.
I think we all learned thisduring the pandemic on Zoom.
I saw this with my students.
They didn't learn as well.
I didn't teach as well, you know,communicating with clients is often less
less effective, you know, so I wouldsay Partly because you get to develop

(34:52):
that sort of like, person, that, that,Evan, you talked about the sort of
personal relationship, not that you'regoing and drinking beers and shooting
pool with people, but you start todevelop a rapport, you know, I think the
PowerPoint ones where you sort of clickthrough and then you take the test are
the least effective, you know, I thinkthe ones where there's a video based
content of a presentation or, you know,kind of the, I mean, I guess the Amber

(35:15):
Book model of sort of a set of videobased animated kinds of content, you
know, those things that are more engagingfor the, we are all visual generally,
you know, I think I'd rather look at agood, beautiful diagram and drawing than
read a wall of text on a, on a slide.
So I think the, for me, the,those, you know, the sort of wall
of text is least good in person.

(35:38):
Pretty good.
And then, you know, the various sort ofvideo and animation and the ones that are
more like storytelling and less like kindof delivering a boilerplate information.

I'd say the same that, always the in person is,
in my opinion the best approach.
One, you're going to have somebody who'sthere looking you eye to eye and you're
engaging in more of a conversationabout what they're there to talk about.
Then they'll also bring materialsand you can actually like, get
your hands on it and pass it aroundthe room and people talk about it.

(36:09):
And then.
What we tend to do is we actually starthaving, and again, we had it today in
this one, I was on zoom and the presenterwas in person in our office and, the
conference room was filled with peopleand they were talking and engaging
and they were talking about how we'veused these products or how we could
use these products within our design.

(36:30):
And it more is based off of how wouldwe do something affects us, that affects
our designs, it affects our buildings.
And so those to me are always betterbecause, you know, I mean, here's a,
here's somebody on the fly, talkingabout, oh, and you know, you could do
this, or you could do that, or, lookat this material and how thin it is
versus, like your conventional, shaftwall system or something like that.

(36:54):
And, , It makes a real impact because,you do have like stuff to pick up and
hold in your hands and pass around, themost effective presentations, you usually
have like models and stuff in them, right?
Where you know, people can kindof get down and start looking at
things and, turn it upside down andturn around and say, okay, now I'm
understanding this a little bit more,

right?

exactly, or, or turn it upside down and say,
huh, doesn't that look better?

Well, well, I agree with the in person thing, but
what's the number of firms thatare like small firms or that don't
have

Well, yes.
Yes.

product manufacturers coming to the door like
Kevin alluded to early on in
the

Yeah.
Yes.

the product manufacturers who are creating this coursework that
goes online Like, we are not as interestedin checkbox based, and so, Kevin, you
talked about Amber Book's offering that'scoming out with, with their continuing
education approach, and they want to,they want it to be really practical for
people, they want it to be actionable,they want it to be potentially career

(37:59):
shifting, that's another question, ifyou guys have ever had kind of a course
that has shifted your career in any way.
We can talk about that maybe in a minute,but, but this idea of content delivery,
I think visual is, is, is super key.
Interactive and engaging is key.
My favorite part of live Stuffis the question and answer period

(38:19):
at the end because that's when

Yeah.

practical stuff comes
out
or

Right.

I'm using your stuff has never done this and they can
correct them and say, well, we've
advanced or, you know, there's, there's,
so

Yeah.

for a real conversation that is the benefit of being in person
and in a larger office setting, right?
Where we learn through osmosis ofwhat, what challenges are other people
coming up with that will deal with thisassembly or this system or whatever.
And I can learn through.
that challenge that they're havingthat I don't even have, right?
So I agree, like in person is awesome.

(38:52):
And yet there's so much thatwe can't do it like that.
So the,

Yeah.

here I think is, is valid though, to the people creating the
courses, like we're not interested inslide based presentations with little
quizzes at the end, as much as we areengaging real world practical stuff,
but also some kind of tangible, Idon't know how that works, but, but
it

Right.
Right.

some innovation that could happen here.
Mm-Hmm.

Yeah, I think we, again, we're, I'm down here in Southwest
Virginia and the AI chapter I wasrepresenting a few years ago, we had
the largest geographic area, but thesmallest number of members so we covered,
you know, I don't know, a third toa half of the state, you know, from
Lexington all the way down to the, toTennessee, you know, to the coalfields.

(39:38):
You know, we had maybe 225 members,compare that to Northern Virginia,
Richmond, Hampton Roads, wherethey had hundreds and hundreds in
that very compact geographic area.
So one of the circles we had as, as a,as a local chapter trying to deliver,
you know, continuing education andjust, events to our, to our membership
was the, you know, if I can't get themto drive to Roanoke, it doesn't work.

(40:00):
Right.
And I'm 40 minutes from Roanoke, you know,Roanoke sort of the city where there was
a little cluster, you know, so, so wew we had routinely sort of members who,
you know, they couldn't come to events.
They weren't able to, you know, thenthe pandemic hit and all of a sudden
we were able to, to share some thingsin a different, a different way.
So I think there was some good thingsthat have come out and we're all more
savvy with these platforms now than,than we were maybe five years ago.

(40:22):
Um, But I, you know, I think for,for practitioners who are, who are
solo or small group, small firm, youknow, if you're not in a big city,
Cormac, you're in Detroit, right?
Is that, and Evan, how much you're in,

in southern Oregon and I'll just

you know?

in the last two years there have been two in-person lunch and learns.

Yeah, so I think this, you know, the ability of interesting,
innovative content to get delivered, youknow, sort of at your, at your fingertips.
to your fingertips and to, to our, to our,these things, um, our pocket computers
and, and, but in a way that's engaging andthat maybe where we have a sense of agency
and what we're, you know, that I can pickand choose those things that I think might
benefit me or the firm or that projectI'm working on or might help me veer in

(41:03):
another, another direction in my career.
You know, I see a lot of students who,you know, Virginia Tech's a huge program,
one of the biggest in the country.
You know, we've got, I don't know,700 undergrads and a five year
bachelor's or something like that.

of him.

Yeah.
I should say I'm not the Kevin Jones,the famous football player, obviously.
Um, you know, those whomight know Virginia Tech,
sort of that, that's not me.
Uh, he and I know each other, but,um, but, yeah, I had to clarify that
when I first came back to teach here.
Like, I am not the football player.
Um,
but,

a bunch of

yeah,

signing up for your class and

yeah.

like, no, no, not that

Yeah, whoops, yeah, swing and a miss, yeah.
It hasn't gotten me free dinnerreservations or anything yet, so, Yeah,
I was going to say sort of all thesestudents, you know, like, you know, in
any given class of 20 in my design lab,there's two or three really passionate,
sharp designers, two or three whoperhaps could have considered another
major three years before they get to me.
I teach in the fourth year, Iteach the more technically oriented

(41:58):
class in the fourth and fifth year.
Um, you know, they might have gottensome advice in second year to go, go
someplace where they'd be happier.
Then there's a whole bunch in themiddle that are like looking for
how they fit into the profession.
You know, and I also teach professionalpractice where we actually get
to talk about like, Hey, there'sdesigners, but there's like a
thousand other things you might do.
So I think this ability to use continuingeducation, like in a, to design your

(42:21):
career, to really think strategicallyabout those things that you might be
interested in, or if you just want tomake a hard pivot, you know, as a way
to try something out, you know, I thinkthose are sort of opportunities that
are maybe, it's latent and it's there,um, but if it could be capitalized
or expanded, that would be great.
I know I'd be happier, sort of,with the choices in front of me.

You know, it's interesting you say that because, Even through
CEUs and, the more and more I engagewith manufacturers and stuff, the
more and more they actually engage andwant architects to to work for them.
like, how do you use this systemor how would this system best,
benefit the practice or the buildingindustry or things like that.
And, it's very interesting that Iknow a lot of architects who actually

(43:06):
work on the manufacturer side, ofthings, whether it's through their,
on their technical side or, sales andkind of like expertise side of things.
And, it's kind of interestingthat, CEUs could lead people to.
My passion is this and, tell memore about this and then actually
have other avenues of the, of theprofession that they could go to.

(43:27):
as is funny enough, I actually know areally good friend of mine who, I've
seen a couple of times at the, AIAnational that, you know, he was an
architect and then he decided to, youknow, pursue the manufacturer side of
things and how he's bridging the gapbetween manufacturers and the profession.
And it was all through, um, basicallysitting through and engaging with their

(43:51):
local rep for, you know, a particularproduct that then, because he became
kind of like the subject matter expertwithin his office of utilizing these
types of systems that he ended upgoing and working for the, the company
that, we had come in and given himthe turkey sandwich and the cookie.

Yeah, and I think the, you know, I'm of, so I got my MArch degree
in 2004, and then the Great Recessionhit, you know, three or four years in
as a practitioner, so there's this sortof me in this kind of middle generation,
right, of, you know, where a bunch ofus left, those of us who stayed are,
you know, I'm teaching now, but maybethere's a demand, because you kind of

(44:30):
have this missing middle, you know.

Mm-Hmm.

also have this equitable access to the profession, you know,
for people of color, for, um, sort ofdifferent gender identities and things,
you know, like, in what ways might, youknow, could continuing education evolve
to make those things more open, to make,to make them more, like, if you're stuck,
can you get unstuck by chasing, you know,sort of a new career path, um, Um, You

(44:56):
know, again, I'm back to a little bitof wondering of beyond HSW, you know,
I think we need to innovate practice ifwe're going to tackle climate change,
not just projects, you know, so it'slike, should there be practice, you know,
innovating practice learning units, shouldthere be, you know, these, these other,
again, back to these other categoriesthat, that, you know, I know as a sole

(45:16):
practitioner, I would love to go sort oflike, you know, You know, this is where
podcasts are great, and EntreArchitect,and you know, all the, there is this
network, you know, of people who identifythis need, especially sort of in 2007,
8, 9, um, you know, for, for sort ofsharing of knowledge in different ways.
So, I think there's, I don't know,I wonder if we cast the net too
narrowly sometimes when we'retalking about continuing education.

(45:39):
Yeah,

Right.
And, and there's,

exactly.

why, like there's a whole business model behind that too.

There's a lot of acronyms in architecture.

there are

In our, in our profession, you know, there's a lot of them.

There are a lot of them.
But, but like that whole idea of likewhere they're coming from is like we're,
we're an audience of consumers for that.
Not, we're not producing thatcontent a lot of the time.
And I, back to Cormac's point where themanufacturers want to hire architects
who know how to speak the languageof architects, know how to speak
the language of design, assemblies,diagrams, like, like the way that you

(46:18):
can, communicate a complex system in amore easy to understand way because of
the kinds of communication and, and,you know, project challenge styles that
you've been trained to, to overcome.
I think all of that stuff is super valid,Kevin, so to your point, like, uh, the,
we should have kind of a brainstormingsession and, and I think that this
is kind of where, Architects do haveother avenues to pursue to do good for

(46:44):
the entire profession at a professionlevel, working on the profession
rather than working in the profession.
Kind

Yeah.

scenario.
Um, there's a lot of potentialthere for people to consider.

I totally agree with that.
And, and, Kevin, you were alluding tothe fact that, it could be used as a
platform because I know that, podcastingand you said EntreArchitect and things
like that are kind of these places forinspiration we need to use that more for
how we kind of, Do this practical changes.
I, I know that, EntreArchitect justhad their, their annual conference

(47:18):
and, you know, not talk too much aboutit, but it is a place where, sole
practitioners or, small firm, people.
people come together and they, talkabout innovations and how that they can
change, their aspect of the profession.
And, utilizing things likecontinuing education to better
practice, are, are some of those.

(47:38):
And, and they gear that towards that.
I think, , in the way that AIA may doit a little bit differently because,
you know, it is more like, they don'thave the mechanism to create a lot of
the, the continuing education, but thecontinuing education is coming to them.
Okay.
Well, you know, that's great.
That's interesting.
We'll go ahead and certify thatso that, our members can benefit

(48:00):
from this, HSW or whatever it is,but, it doesn't lend itself towards
the innovation side of things.

Agreed.

lends itself towards like, again, as we said, started
from the beginning, the box checking.

Yeah, it's really reactive, right?
I mean, it's, it's, it's like, canyou ever innovate or be ahead of
something if you're always reacting,not being proactive, and like with
AIA, it certifies things, right?
And I sometimes think that you getthis for whom, by whom, like, you
know, you decided that these are thethings everybody has a framework by
which they operate a big institutionlike that, you know, also does, and

(48:37):
I, I think this, this space sort ofthe, You guys are in and I know Erin
Pellegrino at Out of Architecture, likethere's some interesting like people
challenging things, you know, so it'slike can, can, um, can continuing
education be a disruptor in that way?
I think that disruptors a 10 year oldterm, but, can other ways to, to just

(48:57):
frame it differently, I think is, is, youknow, that there's opportunities there
to deliver different kinds of contentto deliver content different ways.
You know,

Right.

to meet, to reach different audiences for different purposes.
Um, you know, I think the, yeah,anything that's not, yeah, we're
back to moving beyond box checking.
But, you know, it's like a challenge,maybe it's a little bit of a challenge
to sort of, the Allied's and the, and theacronyms and the AIA and those things to
like, you know, don't be too comfortable.

know, I always go back to things that Evan talks about with
his other podcasts, he talks to theinnovators that affect our industry that,
saw no real innovation in the industry.
in the industry.
So they had to go the adjacentside of things to affect
change within our industry.
I think, you know, the use of thesetools of, continuing education and the

(49:52):
way that you use them, the way that,you know, it can kind of like back to
the idealized way that you could useCEUs, could be that it helps drive
innovation of all sorts of differentkinds within the profession rather than
kind of adjacent to it like Erin andother people who are trying to disrupt
things from the outside because theinside doesn't seem too eager to change,

Well, yeah, they're not satisfied.
Right.
I think that there's there's obviously afew different attitudes in the industry.
There's those who want to keep doingthings the way they've always been
doing them You would just call thatthe status quo, and it's just the
machine keeps moving, and then there's
others who are

right?

right?
Truly,

Right.

could be a project, it could be the profession, it could be leadership,
it could be a number of things, andthose are the ones who are really pushing
those, trying to, you know, make thosethings better over time, for sure.

Right.

I do

yeah, I think.

here.
I'm curious if you guys have seen thiskind of play out in your firms that
you've worked for or on projects thatyou've done where like this kind of
CE paradigm has contributed to, justcall it like your expertise, either,
you know, amongst a group of colleaguesor whatever to, you know, That you've

(51:11):
been able to leverage in that way to,to just be a better architect, but also
like a mentor and a leader in your firm.

I've,

Yeah,

leg

you know, be through, the experience of doing a lot of
different adaptive reuse and, large scalerenovation projects and things like that.
a lot of what I do.
do when I seek out, CEUs arethings that kind of help improve my
understanding, knowledge, trends,and things like that in adaptive
reuse so that I can be that resource.

(51:42):
Because a lot of times, and,know, funny to say, even some of
our, basic tools like Bluebeam.
are putting out, white papers,or they call it a blue paper,
on, trends in, adaptive reuse.
And, and these are the things,it's , oh, this is interesting.
And so they, they're talking aboutall of these different things.
And so I've learned a lot throughkind of outside forces, as well as

(52:06):
pairing it up with kind of like myown practical experience on how I
can continuously improve when we goafter these adaptive reuse projects.
And so I don't callmyself an expert in it.
I've done a lot and they could technicallyconsider me one, but it's more of
just, I feel like where my expertisein that is, is I know where to go.

(52:26):
I know what to ask.
And I, and if I don't knowwhat, I know where to go.
And it's through a lot of these, exactly.
And it's, and it's through a lot ofthese like CEUs that I've done where,
you know, I'm learning how to usethe systems and the design trends
and things like that as part of this.
what is now becoming kind of moreof like my passion side of like
projects I would love to work

yeah, it's great.
Most of my 20 year career has beenadaptive reuse, you know, so tax
credits and, you know, how to makesomething thin when it needs to be
thick, but it needs to look thin.
Um,

Yeah.

you know, uh, those kinds of things.
And I think for me, maybe twoexamples come to mind, Evan.
Um, the firm I worked for, the smallboutique firm, They were really
engaged in the local community, doingprojects that were architecture,
but everyone sat on boards.
So it was a little bit of a kindof culture of, of the civic, sort
of citizen architect mentalityin the firm I worked for.

(53:18):
And I think I was predisposed tothat a little and chose, chose to
work there, um, partly because Ifelt that authenticity and alignment.
But then, you know, got, gotthe bug and, Integrative Design
Lab here in, in Blacksburg.
You know, the, the kick the tires, it'sgotta be plausible kind of building.

Mm-Hmm?

You know, one semester, but, you know, also do, um, the other semester,
I teach a community based design lab wherewe go out and work in rural Appalachia
with communities on real projects.
Um, we don't do design build like,like at Auburn, at the Rural Studio,
but are sort of doing, yeah, I know.
I mean, they're the one to talk about.
I know you have a connectionas well, but, um, you know,

(53:57):
know, know your audience, right?
But the, So yeah, we're in oursecond semester sort of working with
different community in, in Appalachia.
So for me, I would, when I went to AIAnational conventions a few years when I
was sitting on the board, when I go to anNCARB conference, you know, I, I choose
the sessions where I can, I can bolstermy knowledge on community based design
practices, engagement strategies, youknow, these, these, um, you know, I want

(54:21):
to, I don't, I don't want to put my footin my mouth when I walk into a community.
and I think that those, it's also,especially when you go in person, you,
you, you know, I met Rosa Sheng at anNCARB conference, um, you know, and, uh,
we, we had some nice shop talk about,some of the issues in the profession.
So it's, it's great.
You start to build a network whenyou go to these things, especially
if you can zero in on thosethings that you're interested in.

(54:42):
So for me, that's one is the, justsharpen them a pencil on, on, best
practices relative to the communitybased, you know, design efforts.
And then the second, a couple yearsago, I felt a real deficit when I was
working with my students, um, on, I'mgoing to say broadly, say sustainability.
I know that's a loaded word and it meansa thousand things to a thousand people.

(55:03):
Um, but I, I felt that.
Partly because I hadn't done a ton of newconstruction, I was doing adaptive reuse,
so I was always sort of, you know, workingwithin a very specific slice of questions
relative to, sort of environmentaland energy and resiliency questions.
You know, so I, uh, AI Virginia,they basically use the Boston, AIA

(55:24):
Boston or the, the group up therethat had 10 hours of embodied carbon.
Um, and it started 101, here'swhat embodied carbon is.
And there was a session on structuresand a session on systems and a session
on interiors and a session on productsand, and then on, environmental
declarations and, you know, kindof really got into the weeds.
and I, and AIA Virginiasort of put those on.

(55:45):
What was interesting was theysort of played the video,
which you can find on YouTube.
You can go watch them tonight if you want.
But then, you know, to supplement it.
They did the live in person Q& Athing, Evan, that you liked, where,
they sort of played the 40 minute,content that had already been made.
But then they fielded, via Zoom, acouple of local experts or people

(56:05):
from the region who could then answerquestions or speak to the things
that had been shared in the video.
So that for me has changed some ofthe ways I talk with the students,
when I critique their work or when Iwrite a design brief for the, for the
studio, you know, because I just taughtEmbodied Carbon and played one of their
videos in professional practice lastweek, you know, cause I, it's like, we
need to be talking about these thingsand say, do you know what this means?

(56:28):
And they're like, kind of, I tookEBS, you know, and they sort of
understand it, but they haven'thad to put it into, into use yet.
You know, so that was one where I felta deficit and sort of sought out content
because I wanted to, both in my own work,I do smaller projects, so moving the
needles may be a little bit smaller, butI wanted to be a little sharper there, but
sort of working with, you know, 40 kids ayear, who are going to go out and change

(56:51):
the profession, I wanted to make surethat my game was at least up to, up to
little, not, not, I'm not an expert, um,but I wanted to be a little more fluent.

there's so much out there, these resources
that
you

Yeah.

can kind of minor or specialize in
an

yeah.

Mm-Hmm?

for your own career advancement, but also for the
benefit of, name it, your firm, your

Yeah.

your community, whatever it is, um, to really
differentiate you amongst others.
your colleagues and, or yourcompetition as it may be, right?
So I, I think

Yeah.

it's a great way and, and a lot of times at no cost, right?
It does cost time, but it may notcost you money and you really can
set yourself apart in meaningfulways through these resources.
I think it's, it's prettyvaluable in that way.

Where do you think the, you know, we're all inundated with information

Mm.

long, every day?
Like, you know,

I didn't

I don't know if you've heard, yeah, yeah,

I haven't noticed that

sorry.
Evan, you're just in thisblack void, you know, so,

No,

I know it maybe doesn't penetrate the void, but, you know,
so it's, you know, I know sometimes,especially even when I was a junior
or young architect, you know, 10 or15 or now 20, gosh, 20 years ago, um,
you And, uh, you know, I remember afellow showed up and he was talking
about a product and he was like,this is environmentally friendly.
I was like, tell me more.
And he goes, well, it'sgot 2 percent corn in it.

(58:13):
It's like 2 percent corn.
What does that mean?
You know, it's basically talkingabout ethanol, you know, is there
a challenge to kind of separatingthe wheat from the chaff?
You know, like when there is all ofso much content at your fingertips,
like how does one, you know,what are the trusted resources?
And I guess AIA certifying things isa metric that one might use, you know,

(58:34):
sort of your firm, letting peoplecome and saying, yes, you may come
through the door with your sandwiches.
And your CEUs is another level of, of,um, uh, you know, of taste or of, of,
um, of, of regulation on those things.
You know, I could watch anyrandom thing on YouTube.
Um, you know, so it's like, how does,when there is so much, how do you,

(58:55):
how do you zero in on the good stuff?

I was gonna say it's, it's all based off of, what kind
of catered lunch they bring, but

That could be it.

Yeah.

we're bringing Panera.
Nah,
thanks

Yeah.
Thanks.
Yeah.
You and everyone else.

Yeah, exactly.
You know, but

question.
I think, you know, there
are

it really is.

companies that, have basically become
catalogs for this information.
And then you either
like the way that theydeliver that content or not.
And maybe that's, that's one ofthe more broad ways to do it.
But, um, I, I think that's tough.
I, I honestly have found that like,There's enough pressure on the people,
the presenters to deliver somethinguseful that I think the minimum

(59:39):
bar is actually pretty decent whenit comes to a lot of this stuff.

Yeah.

I don't, I don't have the same affliction Cormac does
of, of seeking these out and, and,and consuming so many of them.
So I'm probably not the right personto ask, but, but it's kind of, to
me, it's kind of like there's certainYouTubers I want to watch, right?
Like, and I follow them and not,

Yeah.

indifferent from this podcast and the audience of this podcast, right?
So to me, it is kind of about the peoplewho are doing it and the ones who are
available to field questions and, and

Kevin Jones (01:00:09):
Yeah.

Evan Troxel (01:00:10):
that, that I get with them.
Um, I think, I think sometimes thatcan happen at a brand or a company
level, but usually it's going tobe at the personal level for me.

Well, we're back to relationships again, right?
You know,

Cormac Phalen (01:00:22):
Yeah.

know,

it's

you know, a minute ago we were at ethics, like we were at
ethics, relationships, communication.
Yeah, we cover all the,

all the,

all the, the essential ones.
Um,

And, and those are how you distill some of the things that you pursue
as your basis of knowledge is, like howtrustworthy are they, you know, I mean,
at the core of things, I mean, you know,is this just, are you here just giving us
a sales pitch and sandwiches or are youactually sharing content that's usable
we can be the innovators that we want tobe with, your, assistance kind of thing.

rely on.
Right.

Yeah, exactly.

I Have I have a kind of a final bonus question here just to
kind of wrap up the conversation andand that is Do you have a favorite?
that you've ever taken and,and so what is it and why?
I, I can go first so that you guysdon't feel like you're on the spot
because this one's been, and Cormacwas there when this happened.

(01:01:18):
It was the Chicago River, thearchitectural tour, right?
And I

yeah.

got credit for going on a boat tour of architecture in the
city of

Wait,

It
was

we did?

And, uh, I, I, Yes, we did.
I had to
self

I'm gonna,

I didn't get, I
didn't
get

oh, okay.

but, but it actually is, um, it is accredited for that
and I mean, so obviously, numberone, it was experiential and it was
interactive and the, the, the docentbasically who's on the boat leading it.
It is super knowledgeable abouteverything that we're seeing, and
it's not about a building product.
It's not about a product category.

(01:01:56):
It's about architecture, and so kindof going back to early on in the
conversation, there's various waysthat you can get continuing education.
and, and for this one for me was, wasreally impactful because I learned a lot
about a city I didn't know a lot about.
I learned a lot about the architecture.
It was a perfect day.
I was on a boat.

(01:02:16):
There were hors d'oeuvres.
There was just, it was great friends.
And, and, and so that one it'shard to replicate that for sure.
So it was probably an anomaly,but, that was my favorite,
um, CE that I've ever done.
How about you guys?
Cormac's looking through his list.
I can see him
scrolling.

I, I, I rea

Number 912.

No.
So, and I was, well, what I was trying todo is just trying to remind myself on the
actual, the people who gave this, and Ibelieve it's in, you know, if somebody's
listening and they're like, no, that's notour name, you dummy, but it's the Society
of Roadside Architecture, I believe iswhat it is, something similar to that.

(01:02:57):
But they gave this amazing, interactiveonline, lecture about Googie architecture.
And, just to like learn about it andthen just, this guy was like, you
know, sketching and drawing and showingdrawings and showing like, old historic
photographs, it's, again, it's thiskind of like, this journey of like how,
old architecture kind of influencedthis Googie architecture and like the

Mmm.

space race and all of that other stuff.
And all of these, like, things thatwere interesting to me is, just like,
space race and all of that other stuff,but how it influences like what I do.
was, I had a blast with that one.
It was, it was great.
And they, opened it up, and everybody,came on, camera and, you know, people were
asking questions and all this other stuff.

(01:03:42):
And much like me taking my daughterto a, Lemonheads concert was the
youngest person on the, uh, lecturefrom most of the people who were there.
But, um, it was, it was just really fun.
To, it was, it was kind of like reallyexciting to kind of just sit there
and play with all the different, like,knowledge of Googie architecture.

I think for me to to maybe come to mind the
first one Evans like yours.
I took a bunch of students, but wedid it through the local AIA chapter.
We drove up to Charlottesville about twohours on a Friday to tour the biggest
mass timber building in Virginia that wasbeing built a few years ago in downtown.
Um, yeah, so it was.

(01:04:25):
Sort of new emerging technology andwanted to sort of learn more about.
There was a lot of our membersactually made the trip.
You know, so it tells me thatit was sort of intriguing and
it was something exciting.
It got people interested.
It was the reason I went and sortof drug, drug some students with me.
it was great.
It's the nicest smellingjob site I've ever been on.
It just was like a pineforest, you know, it was, um,

Yeah.

know, but, uh, you know, the contractor was there and, uh,
the kind of builder owners rep, um,talked about kind of the why, the why
behind the thing, which I think forme, I, maybe it's just some architect
brain or professor brain or whatever.
It's like, I need to get tothe why, you know, kind of.
Here's where we are, but Iwant to go three steps back
to get to the core question.

(01:05:06):
So, you know, they did a really goodjob of explaining, you know, sort
of what the goals of the projectwere, and why that material, and
the advantages and disadvantages.
And, you know, I think it was just,like you said, it was experiential.
It was there, the sun was setting,it was a nice day in April.
You know, so there werea number of things.
Maybe all CEUs should be on a boat withhors d'oeuvres at the sunset, you know,

should.
Yeah.

and smell like pine forest.
Yeah, um, and, uh.
But then the other one, youknow, I think at the AIA

Yes.

Conference in New York, which was in 2018?
it was at one of the big sortof famous, you know, showrooms
there, or you know, playhouses.
And, um, it was the, um, I can't rememberher name, but, uh, she was the, the
business director of Bjarke Ingels Group.
Uh, and she gave a really, she gave areally riveting sort of talk about Bjarke.

(01:05:56):
and the ways that their interest ininnovative design, you know, that they
were sort of out front on innovativedesign and how they were trying to get
their business practices to catch up.
Uh, you know, so it was, um,yeah, I probably have it written
down in a sketchbook somewhere.

We, yeah, I was gonna say we,
we
were there.

up episode because we were there as well, and it
was

Oh, nice.
Yeah.

gave.

Yeah.

uh, I think Yash, I think she's the CFO of,

Something, yeah, yeah, yeah, it was here.
Yeah.

just coming at the, the practice of architecture
from that side of it, right,

Yeah.
Yes.

business,

Yes.

Yeah.

right?
And I

Yeah.

that was a great, great

Yeah.

was so good.

You know, so it's,

credit for that.

yeah, yeah, yeah.
Had my little thing on, you know, and,
um,

Right.

tell that Cormac is the one like I go to AI events and I
have to dig out my number on my phoneto write down my AI number, but I
think Cormac, you could probably likerattle yours off, you know, by heart.

so you can't see it, but like right there.

Lanyards.

all of my lanyards are hanging up right behind my head.

Yep.

tons.

Conference
nerd.

Yeah.

for one, because I let a friend of the show
and just a friend borrow.
Remember we were leavingearly from Chicago, Evan,

Yep.

and I let somebody borrow so that they could go and
listen to the final keynote that wecouldn't and she never returned it.

I have an incomplete set,

I'm texting her right now.

maybe all good content is sort of surprising or unexpected
or, you know, sort of, um, catchesus in some way, you know, that,

Yeah.

that, uh, is unexpected or pushes us beyond something, you
know, I think the best lecturesI go to in a building next door,
you know, from visiting me.
Architects and scholars and thingsare those ones where I walk out
with more questions, you know, thanI went in with, you know, and it
cause it sticks in the brain, right?
It sort of stays with you for a while.

(01:07:55):
So

Yeah.

maybe that's good content is if it does that.

Evan and I periodically go to MDC, Monterey Design Conference,

a

and

as

one of the amazing things about that is like the, the
types of lectures that they bring in.
And there was one that I don't knowwhat I was really expecting out
of, this Oklahoma architect, MoranElliott, after he was done, I felt
like I was leaving a Rocky movie.
I was like, let's gopunch some architecture.

(01:08:27):
You know, it was just like, I mean,that was like the excitement that I'm
looking for when I go to these things.
And sometimes I'm like,sorely disappointed.
And sometimes I'm like, yeah,let's go beat something up.
Not in the, you know, like, okay,how about I, let me restate that.
Let's go hug some architecture.
I'll do it that way.

violent outcome?
Thank you.

The nonviolent solution of,
of, uh, you know,appreciating architecture.
Sure.

this took an interesting turn.
So

Well, this has been a fun conversation.
You know, continuing educationis a double edged sword.
It's one of those things where a lot ofpeople look at it and they're like, Oh, I
gotta

Yeah.

And there's other people who are using
it to
their

Yeah.

so to me, I think that is something that was worth talking about
today, because I think we uncoveredquite a few things in this conversation
that really show that can takeadvantage of this stuff to improve all
kinds of

Yeah.

in, many different ways.
And I think there were sometips in here for the people
creating the content as well.
but a shout out to Amber Book forsponsoring this episode because of their
upcoming continuing education.
offerings they'll be out soon.
So we should hopefully have alink in the show notes for what
they're going to be working on.
And Kevin, we appreciate youcoming on the show to talk about

Yeah.

subject today.

Yeah.
I appreciate it.
It's nice to chat with you guys.
And I'd be remiss for my students if Ididn't sign off the way I sign off all
my emails, with high fives all around.
So,
high fives all around.
Thank you guys.
Appreciate it.
Alright.
Cheers.

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#357 - ‘The Value of Lifelong Learning in Architecture’, with Kevin Jones

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}#357 - ‘The Value of Lifelong Learning in Architecture’, with Kevin Jones