The Bouwkunde Winkel

Bouwkundewinkel Eindhoven, comprising a team of four students from the faculty of the Built Environment, offers advice and support to challenge owners in building, living, and the living environment. They provide advisory reports and design solutions, while ensuring effective communication between clients, students, and faculty supervisors.

Teacher: Faas Moonen (responsible teacher).
Academic level: Both Bachelor and Master students of the Built Environment.
Stakeholders: Member of the board of the bouwkundewinkel (contact with the challenge owner and provides the predetermined assignment), Professor of the built environment (supervising and tutoring the group related to the content), Challenge owner (provides the assignment or so–called challenge).
Disciplines: Built Environment
Resources: Challenges provided by real-world challenge owners; facilities and materials provided by Built Environment faculty.

BACKGROUND

The Bouwkundewinkel belongs to the Science Shops connected to the Eindhoven University of Technology. They help groups and individuals who have problems or questions in the field of the built environment, but do not have the financial means to call in a regular consultancy firm or building company. In 1974 Temagroep Planning started their activities regarding research for socially disadvantaged groups. As a result the Planalogies Advies Buro (PAB) was born. This shop was part of the department of the Built Environment of the Technische Hogeschool Eindhoven. In 1985 the PAB merged with the Bouwkundewinkel of the department of the Built Environment. The Bouwkundewinkel is currently the only Science Shop left at the Eindhoven University of Technology. Science Shops are information offices which conduct academic research in the social field for little or no costs. These Science Shops built a bridge between University and society.

Without the development of Science Shops in general, their work gained more acknowledgement and appreciation throughout the years, the Bouwkundewinkel could not have existed. In 1985 the board of the department therefore decided to officially acknowledge and support the Bouwkundewinkel. The Bouwkundewinkel is founded by several students who considered social involvement as an important task, a goal that has not changed over the past few years. In recent years the Bouwkundewinkel has meant a lot to multiple individuals and groups who were able to get help with their specific challenges.

SETUP

The Practical Assignment Bouwkundewinkel at our department offers opportunities for students to engage in real-world problem-solving. Here’s how it works:

Requests from practice are received, ranging from addressing existing problems to generating design ideas.
The Bouwkundewinkel translates practical requests into assignments for students, in collaboration with a responsible teacher.
A study plan is prepared, and clients may be asked for additional information.
The teacher supervises the assignment during the quartile and assesses student results.
Upon supervisor approval, a comprehensive report with a (design) solution is provided to the client.
Students can choose predetermined assignments from challenge owners or propose their own, subject to Bouwkundewinkel approval.
Students working on their own assignments are tutored and graded by professors.
Assignments should be practice-oriented, include research aspects, and require approximately 140 hours of study.

In completing the assignment, students can earn 5 ECTS credits, subject to meeting the following conditions:

The assignment should come from practice, with an actual client and a research/problem related to the built environment.
The final product, the report with the proposed (design) solution, should incorporate research aspects.
Students are expected to allocate approximately 140 hours to the assignment, with hours and activities logged and a detailed plan verified.

This allows students to gain valuable practical experience while receiving academic recognition for their work.

INTENDED LEARNING OUTCOMES (ILOS)

After completing the course, students can convert a practical demand or practical problem to a pragmatic solution (more explicitly executable advice).

To do so, students will:

analyze the practical issue (a design question, imperfection, or failing);
translate this into an adequate defined problem;
collect relevant information (by inquiries, literature study, or measurements);
generate alternatives and,
select a workable answer to the issue.

Students will also check the solution that will be advised to the client and report this in an adequate way, that is clear to the client (to a level that is understood by a layperson).

LEARNING ACTIVITIES

Students work in groups or individually on a design or research project.
Students go through an iterative design process.
Students participate in feedback sessions with their supervisor and challenge owner.
Students write a report.
Students present their results to their challenge owner.

ASSESSMENT

The students receive feedback from their coach of the faculty and challenge owner regularly. The project’s result will be graded with respect to the students’ developed competencies. This grade is 100% of the final grade.

EVALUATION

Students are asked to fill in a questionnaire at the end of the course. This questionnaire focusses on what went well during the course and what can be improved.