Cities form from layers of different elements and uses to create an urban fabric. These elements include the location, geography, demography, culture, transportation, and building type. Buildings can be thought of in a similar way. Today, successful urban and building design engages in the idea of mixed-use, not only in the program, but in the diversity of spaces created and users of the space. One lost layer to Alexandria is at the northern edge of Old Town. This area is bookended by the Potomac Electric Power Company's abandoned power plant. The site sits along the Alexandria waterfront and Mount Vernon Trail with views looking toward Washington, DC. The power plant closed its doors in 2012 and there are no plans yet to redevelop the site. To regenerate new life to this neighborhood, a new satellite campus for Virginia Tech']s Schools of Visual and Performing Arts will replace the abandoned plant. This campus aims to integrate a long lost piece of Alexandria's waterfront to the city and community. The signature building of this campus is a two-stage theatre that weaves together the new student body with the existing Alexandrian community. / Master of Architecture

No description available.

D.Phil. / This research will focus on a description and exploration of the management principles, procedures and processes in a university-based, in-service training programme for unqualified practicing teachers in community schools in the Orange Farm area. It is aimed at the construction of a theoretical framework, illuminating the evolving management model in such a way that it could be conceptually transferred to similar organic training programmes. The conceptual framework, which will be constructed from a literature investigation, will be complemented and integrated with a problematised and interpretive documentation of the management structures as they evolved in the project. Main theory concepts that will be investigated are community education, inservice teacher education, educational management and adult education. The research report commences with an orientation to the study in which the groundedness of the design is presented and discussed. It includes a brief presentation of the researcher's presuppositions and assumptions as well as a - description of the context of the research. The main research question is of an open and ethnographic nature and states the problem as being the unknownness of management structures in organic community education programmes. The need for an ecologically or conceptually valid management model is expressed concisely in the literature on NGO education programmes. Management models that function successfully in formal education are assumed to fail in community programmes, which often reveal highly idiosyncratic characteristics. The literature study is presented subsequently. General management principles are explored and discussed. This is followed by a detailed discussion on educational management and its relation to general management. A discussion of the function of INSET and the management of change conclude this section. In the following section of the research report the design of the field research is discussed against the background of the paradigm of qualitative research, describing the case format as mode of exploratory descriptive research. The analysis of the written documentation as major research activity is emphasised. The data of the report are then presented in the format of examples and description of the various management activities in the programme. The final categories of data are emphasised with a view to support the construction of the envisaged management model. The report is concluded with the interpretation and validation of the data.

This thesis examines the impact of planning a potential new urban university campus in Springfield, Massachusetts on the city’s long term goals for urban revitalization. By exploring a collaborative and community-oriented process for higher-educational development, I propose a dynamic model that could work as a catalyst for urban revitalization. The study will focus on the following: developing partnerships between the city of Springfield (government, community, local groups) and major educational institutions (such as the University of Massachusetts system); identifying potential sites suitable for the anticipated urban/mixed-use campus or compound; and studying and analyzing the forces within the city (neighborhoods around site) that would inspire and shape the ideal concept for a campus master plan. I will use four major research strategies: (1) Developing a partnership that is to be both interactive and instructive, (2) selecting and analyzing three or more best practice case studies, (3) analyzing the existing conditions in Springfield, particularity the surroundings of selected sites, and, (4) a critically and professionally developed urban design vision for the right kind of university campus in Springfield that would highlight the main ideas and conclude with a master plan as part of the overall recommendations of this research. Data are collected from books, journals, interviews, newspapers, website sources, and other published reports using a mixed-methods case-study approach. I expect that the study of this topic and the urban design programming and work associated with it would yield a successful model for campus planning and be potentially adopted or adapted by others in the future.

No description available.