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Want to call yourself an Architect? Just get licensed

Over the past few months we’ve all been talking about people calling themselves architects. This is a very sensitive subject for so many reasons. In one sense it’s a bit of an existential problem facing our profession. But then again it’s also just dumb and obvious. Want to call yourself an architect? Don’t like the term intern? Fine. Go to school, work for a few years, then take the Architecture Registration Examination. It sucks, but then it’s easy. Someone asks you what you do and you can proudly puff up your chest and say “I AM AN ARCHITECT.”

If you want to call yourself an architect, get licensed. It’s that simple. There are plenty of excuses and reasons, some valid, some not, as to why people don’t get licensed. Money and Time are two of the biggest excuses.

Money

Being an intern means you’re probably getting paid peanuts, sometimes literally. So what. You went to at least five years of school to meet the typical educational requirement to get licensed. I bet you accumulated some debt then. Paying for tests, while not cheap, is chump change compared to that mountain of money. Think of it this way, you paid tens of thousands of dollars on your education to become an architect and now another two thousand is too much? Come on. Finish what you started, if you want to be an architect, don’t stop short because you want to save a few dollars.

If you don’t have the money? Ask the firm you work for to pay for it. Put the testing fees on a credit card. Take out a loan. Ask your parents for help. Sacrifice some luxuries. Or check to see if your local AIA chapter has scholarships. If you are already self-employed the cost is deductible. The tests are expensive, maybe unnecessarily so. Their cost is out of alignment with what we earn trying to reach licensure, and what we’ll make afterwards. But deal with it. If money is the reason you’re not testing, solve that problem.

Time

I have less than zero sympathy for this excuse. For every person I talk to who says they don’t have time to take the tests, I know of someone who took the tests while working full time, while running a business, while training for a marathon, while raising kids…the list goes on. My oldest daughter was born while I was testing. I took a month off from studying then got back to it. I’ve got a good friend who took all her tests while pregnant. I think the last pre-motherhood test she took was the same week as her due date. I also think she had to retake that test six months later. But you know what? She had plenty of excuses not to test when she did. But she stuck too it. And now she’s an architect. You’ve either got the time to test or you can make the time. If it’s important to you. You know it’s true.

And there it is. If it’s important to you. When someone asks “hey why aren’t you licensed?” There are really only three answers. “I’m not yet qualified to test, according to NCARB”, “I’m currently taking those horrible exams”, or “It’s not important to me to be licensed”. That’s it. Each of those answers of course have some nuances; there are plenty of reasons why getting licensed isn’t your top priority. That’s okay. But don’t tell me it’s because of time or money.

For further reading, here’s a post from Archinect you might enjoy on this subject. You can also read all these amazing posts. Hopefully in 2014, I’ll be able to explain why I’ve been writing so much about unlicensed archtiects. It’s not a witch hunt, I promise. Subscribe to my blog to read more about the tricky world of being an Architect in the 21st century: Shoegnome on FacebookTwitter, and the RSS feed.

Comments

  • December 15, 2013
    reply

    Rogelio Carballo

    I think I need a bit of help here.

    I’m a licensed architect here in Spain. If I go to USA looking for a job, should I say I’m an architect? Because I would say of you that you really are an architect if you come here looking for a job. I have a friend of mine who came from New Jersey after finishing his degree, and for god’s sake, he was as good an architect as any of us. But he had to face an unfair challenge to get his degree recognized here,

    If we agree with you on this subject, maybe we should erase from the history books architects like Le Corbusier, Ricardo Bofill, and many others who never ever got their education finished. I can’t believe that you think that any of our very legally licensed work is as good as Le Corbusier’s, do you?

    On my own experience, I’d been working before I had my degree, only waiting for time to make my final project, and know what? I don’t feel I’m more or better architect than before. Of course, now I have a license number, I’m nº 4374 of galicians architects, but as Iron Maiden said, I’m not a number, I’m a free man.

    By the way…. excellent blog, mate. I love it.

      • March 19, 2014
        reply

        Scott

        if it is marketing as your say (I don’t disagree with this concept) then how do we market our services (as a licensed architect) to differentiate us from the IT architect or the computer architect? (or any other use/variation of the word architect)

        We have passed laws to attempt to take ownership of the word architect but we don’t’ have the right to do this which is why the laws are not enforced against such “architects”. They have a greater law which protects their right to use the word architect. Freedom of speech allows the IT architect to use the word. As long as they can show that are not attempting to deceive the public into believing they are a licensed architect and as long as they are not attempting to perform work that requires an architectural license then their right to use the word architect is protected by the constitution. It is unlikely our profession will ever be able to dismantle the first amendment.

        I would contend the thing that separates us from the other “architects” (as well as separates us from the unlicensed individuals within our own profession) is the license. Why then do we not refer to ourselves as licensed architects. Why do we collectively lament the inability to control the use of the word architect so we can keep it all to ourselves when we could simply embrace the phrase Licensed Architect or Registered Architect and educate the public on what it means to be licensed? Our perpetual fight over the ownership of the word makes our profession look petty, self-important and conceited and IMO, that is poor marketing.

  • December 31, 2013
    reply

    Great blog. if something is important to you, you will definitely find the time and money to do it.

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  • February 5, 2014
    reply

    Jared:

    You’ve got one of the best blogs I’ve seen about to the actual day-in day-out profession of architecture. Of course, I also say that as one who is not a registered architect, so I guess take that comment with a grain of salt. 😉

    For the points that the article is trying to make (the excuses people make about not being registered being silly ones), I wholeheartedly agree. Time and money are little things if you’ve made investments in the education and apprenticing process. And I completely understand that people who have taken the examine have reached a level of competency that should be respected and acknowledged, much like a doctor or lawyer who has passed the “bar” exam (not sure if I spelled that right- I’m not a lawyer either).

    There is a side to this equation that isn’t as clear cut unfortunately. The main issue is the excellent triangle diagram that is somewhere on your site- the 3 sides that make up an architect consisting of Builder, Artist and Philosopher. The ARE tests the Builder and the certainly the technical side of being an Architect. It does nothing about the philosophy and artistic sides (the “poetic” nature of architecture). That’s 2 sides of the triangle missing from the exam process.

    Obviously, the education and degree process should be the measuring stick of the those qualities, or at least that’s the theory. Unfortunately, it’s my experience that, in reality, it’s just not that case. Teaching something as ethereal as raw artistic talent is much harder in practice, although it can be learned. It’s mostly a case of attitude and effort, (like most things I suppose). While there are some natural athletes, most only come about with hard dedication and training and a willingness to push themselves to extreme measure achieve their goals. Becoming proficient artistically is a similar process I believe.

    That’s not to discredit the degree process- certainly there are a LOT of basic design principles that I’ve seen lacking from individuals trying to design who’ve never gotten the degree. Not that hey aren’t talented. But the closest analogy I can make is like the medieval artist who didn’t quite understand the concept of perspective. They painted nice people and landscapes, and certainly there was an artistic quality to what they did, but looking at their art, (especially from a modern perspective) something just seems “off”.

    I do believe the licensing process in general is flawed, but it’s also the best standard we have at the moment; and while we should be trying to improve it, it doesn’t just mean that you should “throw the baby out with the bathwater”, or disregard the title. I think where this gets confusing for people is when you look at the technical side of the registration process and then ask:

    Now that I am registered, is what I am producing Architecture? Is only someone who is Registered able to produce “Architecture”? (Of course, that leads to the question, “what IS architecture”?- I won’t go into that here for time’s sake).

    That’s a MUCH more difficult question and what we REALLY should be asking. There are plenty of architects who don’t produce architecture (either for financial reasons or simply a lack of the artistic side). Not that everything HAS to be “architecture” (although really wouldn’t the world be a great place if it was?).

    But as a counterpoint to the original question- how WOULD one test for the artistic, more ethereal quality that really makes one “an architect”? What would be the standard you’d be judged by, and how in God’s name would everyone ever be able to agree on a common standard for that. It might well be impossible. And by the very nature of trying to define, it, wouldn’t you then limit the end product of what that system could produce? I find those fascinating questions that usually seem to get raised in these debates.

    Thanks for the article!

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