While many people categorize an adventure as some grand journey or wild expedition, University of Idaho student Ryan Erstad said studying abroad can turn something as mundane as being stuck in traffic into an adventure.
Erstad said while in England with a group of students from the College of Art and Architecture, he and his peers ended up stuck in traffic when one of their field trips coincided with a strike on the London Underground.
“We had to ride the bus system for several hours both ways through some of the craziest traffic I have ever seen, while the sidewalks were just absolutely packed with people,” he said. “I’ve never experienced anything like it in my life, and the whole thing had a strange, exhilarating energy in all the confusion.”
Kelton Berrett | Courtesy
A group of students with the College of Art and Architecture spend time touring eco-buildings and sustainably built structures.
Kelton Berrett, a UI alum who traveled in the same group as Erstad, said in addition to London, the CAA group visited Scotland and Wales.
“We started off in Edinburgh and did a week in Scotland where we toured Scottish Parliament before taking a trip to Glasgow,” Berrett said. “We also spent a lot of time at the Center for Alternative Technology in Wales before making our way to London.”
The trip was a part of the College of Art and Architecture”s International Programs, which allow students to choose between studying abroad during the summer in either Rome or England.
The particular trip Erstad and Berrett went on, the Architecture and Interior Design”s London Studies program, takes place every other summer with students traveling to the UK for four weeks.
Berrett, who graduated with his masters in architecture this past summer, said the main focus of the trip was sustainable architecture and the group spent their time learning about how to integrate sustainable living practices with architectural design.
Berrett said one of the most striking experiences involving sustainability was the group”s stay at the Center for Alternative Technology in Wales because of how immersive the experience was.
“Essentially, [CAT has] a bunch of buildings built from alternative materials like straw bale, hemp and other recycled items,” he said. “We ate a vegetarian diet for a week and every night they had guest speakers … it isn”t as radical as it sounds, it was just a different way of living.”
Berrett said his time at CAT, in addition to working with architectural firms in London, gave him hope about the future of sustainable architectural design.
“A lot of times working in architecture is fighting an up hill battle with sustainable planning and building,” Berrett said. “At CAT, everyone was optimistic and passionate and there was this strong sense of community.”
Similar to Berrett, Erstad said the program”s focus on British Green Building, an initiative to develop environmentally conscious structures, allowed him to think about the development of sustainable architecture in new ways.
“I think it helped me understand what a real city is, and how that environment shapes the field of architecture,” Erstad said. “We got the chance to visit several offices while we were there and it was great to see what sort of work they were doing and how their offices functioned to complete some really massive, technically-intensive projects.”
Erstad said his biggest surprise was finding that he had already been familiarized with many of the sustainable building practices encouraged throughout the trip in Moscow classrooms.
“The things that they kept pointing out as really cutting edge systems and design strategies are the same things that every student in the Architecture program in Moscow is really familiar with,” he said. “So the value of this trip for me was in reaffirming how good my schooling has really been to this point.”
Berrett said one of the most prominent ideas he took away from the trip was the value of communication and collaboration.
“Collaboration and interdisciplinarity is what will maintain sustainable results,” Berrett said. “We can”t think of how just architects or politicians will solve the problem, it”s about collaboration and talking to each other … that”s how these problems can really get solved.”
Corrin Bond can be reached at [email protected]