Every year, RIBA facilitates a mentoring program for students of architecture, bringing practices into education to support our future architects.
In 2023/4, over 1,500 students across 37 RIBA validated Schools of Architecture applied to take part, with nearly 500 Chartered Architects and Practices volunteering to mentor them.
Each year, this program offers students a unique glimpse into the realities of architectural practice and helps to build a network and plan for the future. And for architects, the programme offers an opportunity to connect with RIBA Schools of Architecture and support our future architects.
In this blog post, Jamie Campbell (Director, Campbell & Co Architects) and mentee, Victor Ouko, (Brighton University graduate - Architecture BA (Hons)) reflect on their experiences of the RIBA mentoring scheme at Brighton University.
Jamie Campbell (Architect and Director at Campbell & Co Architects)
Why did you sign up to be a mentor?
I started mentoring at the University of Brighton almost as soon as I set up the practice. I remember being a mentee during my final degree year and how it offered a unique perspective into the working world I was about to enter. It was also the first time I had ever been on a building site which was a really exciting and eye-opening experience.
I have always wanted to give back to the future of the profession in a positive way and to share knowledge where possible.
What are the benefits of being a mentor practice?
We feel mentoring is a reciprocal arrangement. We get to discuss the profession with students on the cusp of entering it. We get to learn from their experiences, hear what their priorities are, find out what they have focused on in their learning, what is topical for them and how this is likely to shape their experiences in the future. This all then feeds back into our practice, and we get to use these interactions to shape how we move forward.
A great example of this is how students coming through the University of Brighton have a detailed and in-depth knowledge of environmental and sustainability considerations in the profession (largely thanks to Duncan Baker-Brown leading the charge on this throughout the school). This challenges us to explore these subjects as a practice by questioning our work, obtaining specific CPD on these subjects and feeding this back into our work.
It is important to note that our mentor students are the future of our profession, and we owe it to them to show them as much as possible about the rewarding and hugely fulfilling career they have chosen.
Finally, we have been fortunate enough to bring Victor (one of our mentor students from the 2023 cohort) into the practice last year by offering him a Part I placement and we’re thrilled with how it’s going.
Victor Ouko (2023 Part 1 degree graduate from the University of Brighton)
The RIBA mentoring scheme, introduced to us at possibly the most stressful time in the curriculum, was an experience that completely changed my perspective on what it was to work in an architecture practice.
I was partnered with Campbell & Co Architects, a young, but experienced firm based in Reigate, Surrey. With a small team of architects, they had gone a long way in changing the lives of various families in their community. I was eager to learn what the design process looked like for them as well as what separated them from other firms in the area.
Starting the program, there were certain benefits that were clear from the start: exposure to a professional workspace as well as projects (this came in the form of office visits, site visits and even the unique experience of sitting in on a design review). A professional learning environment different to that of university, then finally, help with the more bureaucratic aspects of architecture: applications, CVs and Interviews.
Initially, I had signed up to the scheme, assuming those would be the most significant take-aways from the experience, however, by committing to a journey that was essentially my first foot into a professional working atmosphere I learned as much about myself as I did the complex trek of becoming an architect. What type of firm do I want to work at? Housing or commercial? Located in a city or town? More importantly, whether I want to continue with architecture and if so, what kind of work environment I would like to adopt.
Campbell & Co was a space in which I felt encouraged to interact with employees, ask questions, work hard, and absorb as much information as I could about the industry. By treating the scheme as an essential part of the learning curve and not just another extracurricular, a handful of students (including myself) found that our mentoring firms had so much they could teach us. A few of us have been fortunate enough to continue learning from the practices who mentored us as our Part 1 work experience.
As far as the positives and negatives of the scheme go, the positives are endless if you fully commit, are willing to learn and apply yourself. The negatives? A bit more on your plate as you reach the final stretch of your undergraduate degree. I’d argue the trade-off was worth it and believe my peers would agree.
How to take part
If you’d like to take part in the program as a mentor or mentee, or simply find out more information, please check out our webpage on the RIBA Future Architects student mentoring scheme.
