By Guest Blogger Matt Kingdon
It was the best of times … it was the worst of times. It was about a year ago that I faced the exciting idea of graduating from an esteemed university. It was about a year ago that I faced the daunting idea of entering that thing they call “the real world.” Talking with friends facing graduation made me realize the job search is something similar to Pan’s Labyrinth -- an infinite amount of paths, all hopeful, but rarely leading to anything more than a dead end. Coming out of school, I felt the same bewildered feeling, but my path led me to a wonderful opportunity at LPA, an outstanding architecture firm.
While you may think the experience section of your resume doesn’t catch any eyes compared to other job seekers, I would say your lack of experience is your greatest advantage. See, the energy and creativity of a student is infectious to a firm and people in general, which is why firms participate in internships, and other student programs including design competitions and charrettes. Maybe it brings people back to the glory days of college, or maybe it is the naivety and innocence of a student that people are attracted to. Either way, the fact that you are a student is what sets you apart from every other aspiring employee.
Think about this … you just spent a year or more developing a thesis on say, conventional design versus sustainable design. You find a firm that you are interested in, and you give them a call or send them an email. “As a student at ‘esteemed university of wherever,’ I am researching this ‘interesting topic here’ for a thesis project. I would love the opportunity to talk with your firm about your work in ‘said expertise’ and get your feedback and insight on my research.” Now doesn’t that sound more enticing than, “I was wondering if you had any positions open?”
Spending the time to talk about one of your student projects is more valuable than handing over a resume. We all talk about making an impression, and there is no greater first impression than an in-depth conversation on a topic that both parties are interested in. 
Now you are not depending on the graphics on your resume as a lasting memory. Instead, a firm remembers you by the research and conversation you have developed as a student. And even if you don’t get a job offer out of it, you have now created a contact to add to your network, which saves me some material for my next post!
Is it a dirty trick? Or could it be inside information? No, but it worked for me, and as a job seeker, you have to sell your greatest assets. As a student with little or no experience in the industry, carrying a portfolio of sleepless nights and tiresome exploration, it is simply that, the greatest asset you have. So this inspirational rant is not meant to try and paint a pretty picture over this disheartening task at hand for so many graduates, but rather, it is to try and share some knowledge a little earlier than most would have realized, hopefully soon enough to help find a job. And also, to remind the profession that the inexperience of a student can be a great asset to a firm.
Matt Kingdon is a Technical Designer who specializes in K-12 schools at California-based LPA Inc.
By Guest Blogger Matt Kingdon
Over the years, LPA has welcomed hundreds of interns into our midst. And unless you're an architecture student at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo -one of the top architecture schools in the nation-you may not know about their partnership with our firm. A byproduct of this partnership is the Professional Studio program, which is now in its third year.
For approximately 10 weeks, the students are required to spend Mondays and Fridays on their assigned studio project, under the advisement of assigned LPA designers; Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays the students are paid employees of the firm, working with project teams throughout the office and taking on a multitude of tasks. For most, this is their first experience in a firm setting, so just the work experience is a huge learning opportunity. Beyond that, we try and incorporate as many LPA resources as possible to open up their minds to different disciplines and realms of the profession; aspects they probably haven't seen in academia.
The students attend project meetings, lunch-and-learns, office meetings, and more informal LPA social events. All of these are great experiences that help them decide what they want to pursue in the profession. While the studio project is the focus of the quarter, it is really the interactions and daily occurrences that they learn from the most.
This week, we'll feature two Professional Studio program participants and read about what inspired them, challenged them, and most importantly, what they learned during their work/design studio program. The challenge was to design an innovative K-12 school that provided supportive learning environments for students with diverse learning preferences. The Cal Poly Studio team was encouraged to think outside of the classroom "box" and design from the inside out.
Working in a group of three, the students spent a significant amount of time researching the principles that shaped their approach. They were to focus on the process of developing design concepts then defending how these concepts translated into space planning, and ultimately the overall campus master plan through the project's progression.
First up, we have ... student Paul Hedgcock.
INSPIRATION
Initially it was research that inspired my studio project but reading deeper into it, I saw that the approach to education was something that was ever evolving. Not that architecture holds all of the answers, but it can provide a dialogue between the built form and how people learn. This dialogue can tell the designers and educators what works and what doesn't work, and how to adapt to an ever changing process. This could have a large impact on society and could actually make a difference in the lives of the students.
CHALLENGES
The greatest challenge was developing an idea and concept that could be meaningful to each member of the team. It was interesting because each of us working on the project attended a different type of school and had gone through our own experiences. Bringing these experiences to the table inevitably brought disagreement, but we had to distill the problem to its fundamentals and really start from scratch.
We had to place ourselves into the positions of educators and school programmers and think about what education meant and what it needed to do. This was the hardest part because none of us had this professional educator experience, and what experience we had as the students, varied among us. Even though it was the greatest challenge, I believe it gave us the best reward because we were able to think through the project in a new way and it gave us a chance to verify our concept throughout the design process.
LESSONS LEARNED
The greatest learning experience I took from this project was that having a strong concept can really help develop the architecture further. Since we went through the exercise of being the educator, we were able to create processes that were meaningful to the program.
I never once felt that anything in the project didn't belong there, or that we added anything in because it was 'cool'. I felt everything served its intended purpose and helped in the overall scheme. I have never quite worked on a project in such depth or clarity. I think this was only possible because our team had several experiences and we worked hard to distill them to the core values.
For more information about the LPA-Cal Poly San Luis Obispo Professional Studio program, e-mail dgilmore[at]lpainc[dot]com.