Has anyone taken the Architectural Technology course?

Of my graduating class I only know of two people that definitely ended up doing something architectural in the London area (However, I didn't keep in touch with a LOT of my class). One went to one of the larger architecture houses in town where she also did all 3 of her co-op placements. The other guy went to a small design-build house builder just outside of town. Quite a few went into various related industries.

Personally speaking, I ended up doing my first co-op at a mechanical/electrical engineering consulting firm and fell in love with that side of the business. I did my other two co-ops with the same firm but come graduation time they weren't in a position to hire so I ended up finding a design job with another M&E consulting firm here in town.

So there are jobs, yes. And a LOT of my class did have job offers waiting for them upon graduation due to their co-op terms. However, not all of those jobs were in London. If you find your passion is strictly related to architecture and you want to work for an architect there are only a few big houses here in town so opportunities are more limited. If that is your goal then I think the only solution is to work your ass off, nail your design projects, make a name for yourself - participate (and and do well) in the Skills Competition that is held each year. Make sure when going out on your co-op interviews that your portfolio is top notch. Obviously this is all good advice for ultimately getting a job in any of the related disciplines however I feel that it's especially important for landing an architecture gig. Oh, and definitely enjoy drawing details... ;-)

Also, upon graduation, if you find that architecture is still your absolute passion, definitely look into going over to Ireland through the relationship Fanshawe has with schools abroad. There's a Honors/Masters BSc Arch. Tech. program at Cork Institute of Technology where you can transfer directly into the 4th year of the program. 10 months there will get you an Honors BSc Arch Tech instead of an Advanced Diploma. 20 months will land you a Masters BSc.

If you're thinking that you want to do Arch Tech first then transition into an Architecture program at a University do your research. Each school is different and some schools offer virtually no credit for any of the classes completed at Fanshawe. If I remember correctly, I think the best case was one school almost gave you equivalent credit to their first year. There were a couple classes you still needed to take in first year before entering second year. Fanshawe was working on fostering a relationship with a School of Architecture (Univ. of Alberta - Edmonton maybe?) that would allow more credit but I don't know if anything ever became of that.

/r/fanshawe Thread