Creativity in architecture design studio. Assessing students’ and instructors’ perception

Abstract

Teaching and assessing creativity is a confronting dilemma in architecture education. With the fact that creativity has many definitions that none of which is universally accepted, having a level of agreement on the creativity perception among both students and instructors is essential to have an effective creativity assessment. The students’ and instructors’ interpretation of creativity in the architectural context should vary from a level of education to another based on the needs of each level and the intended learning outcomes of the Studio. This research investigates the level of agreement and disagreement of creativity perception between a group of students and their instructors within the architectural context of the design studio. Interviews and surveys were conducted with a group of Architecture students (third year) and their instructors to assess their perception of creativity. The findings show that creativity is conceptualized differently among students and instructors. Students and their instructors have more disagreement than agreement on how they perceive creativity in the architectural context. The required areas of improvement in architecture education will be suggested.