Category Archives: 2000s

Anzie Gilmore (2004)

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Baby on Board
By Anzilla “Anzie” Gilmore
Licensed 2004

I attended Prairie View A&M University, an HBCU located 50 miles outside of Houston, Texas. HBCU’s have nurturing and support dyed in the wool. But what PVAMU’s School of Architecture (SOA) did not have was very many licensed architects on faculty, and not one black female architect to serve as a role model. So I graduated from PVAMU, bound for graduate school with the plan to follow in the footsteps of the most successful person I knew in architecture, the dean of our school, Dr. Ikhlas Sabouni. Dr. Sabouni or “Doc” as we called her then, was stylish, she held a Ph.D. in architecture and she was the boss. She had not taken the A.R.E. because she did not need to. In my eyes, neither did I. So I went to the University of Texas at Arlington and emerged a year and a half later with my master’s degree, the credential I needed to teach architecture. Continue reading →

Annette Carter (2004)

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Get What You Came For
By Annette K. Carter
Licensed 2004

Art history class at Boston Latin Academy is where it all started in my adolescence. In this class, we learned about things as disparate as the history of Chinese calligraphy, the artistry of American quilting, and Impressionist painters. A seemingly tedious task of selecting three artists’ names out of a hat would have a tremendous impact on my life.

As luck would have it, one of the three “artists” I randomly selected was Frank Lloyd Wright. At age 12, after researching and learning about Mr. Wright and his work in the fascinating field of architecture as both a science and an art, I decided that I would become an architect when I grew up.  I considered no other careers from this moment on. 

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Saundra Little (2002)

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The A.R.E. Exams saved my life!
(Like the song “Last night a DJ saved my life“)
By Saundra Little
Licensed 2002

I was very reluctant to write my story for Archstories because I knew I would have to revisit my circumstances during my exam test-taking timeframe. My story of passing my licensing exams is a story of Faith in the middle of adversity.

My resume and credentials do not show the pain behind the scenes in April 2001 when I started my A.R.E. exams. I was in the middle of a horrible divorce and studying for my architectural license at the same time. Studying was my way of focusing on something other than all the troubles surrounded my family at the time. My goal was to focus on anything but my current situation and work towards a better life for my daughter after all of this was over. Continue reading →

Garfield Peart (2009)

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The Best New Year’s Present Of My Life:
Surviving the Architecture Registration Exams.
Garfield Peart
Licensed 2009

As I think about the Architecture Registration Exam (ARE) process, there is only one word that really comes to mind;”STRESS”; Oh and one more – “PAIN”! I got licensed in May 2009 in the state of Virginia after starting three years prior while we were living in Williamsburg for a short period of time. I took the test when it was still nine sections with the three graphics sections – Site Design, Building Construction, and Building Planning – the only ones with vignettes.

I started off strong by passing Construction Documents (CDs). As with most of the tests, CDs has so much information, 50% I had never seen before, that I am still shocked with passing it the first time. After that momentum, I feel like I could have these tests licked! I went on to fail the next two sections, Material & Methods and General Structures; studying for both consumed much of the previous 6 to 8 months. I was absolutely crushed and wondered why anyone would put themselves through all this pain for a piece of paper!! It took all of me not to go back and retake those tests before proceeding with the others – almost a year in and only passing one test! I picked myself up and somehow got the courage to continue on with my original plan. I went on to surprisingly pass the next one – Lateral Forces – along with all three graphic sections on the first tries!! By that time I was back in Atlanta and transitioning into a new firm with all the confidence in the world.
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Andrew Thompson (2005)

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My Motivator
Andrew Thompson
Licensed 2005

I took the last written exam back in 1995 before NCARB switched over to computers. At that time, the entire exam was given once a year over a four-day period.

I did the whole 12-hour charrette with about 1,000 other folks on some pier in New York City. That was some stress! I ended passing only Site Design so the following year, I marched into the new era of doing the exam on the computers. Continue reading →

Jerryn J. McCray (2007)

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Designing redundant, boring, practical buildings got me over the hump!
by Jerryn J. McCray, AIA
Licensed 2007

I was the best and worst intern ever. I was skilled, talented, ambitious, arrogant and black. I wasn’t designed to make it. I was often the only one and I was consistently pissing off my bosses. I was completing tasks at a high level but there was no way I would ever be promoted (due to my “attitude”) without credentials.

I WENT TO WORK

I started studying immediately after an audit by NCARB. Apparently, I fulfilled the IDP requirements suspiciously fast and they had to shake me down. This was 2005. I escaped Auburn University in 2002 (3 years flat). Whatever… I studied every day. I studied every night. I studied on weekends. I passed the first two exams with ease.

I HIT A WALL

No one ever told me many of the correct answers would require actual experience. I flunked the first structures exam because I simply didn’t know what the hell I was doing. No amount of studying and grit (arrogance) could make up for the fact that I was 26 years old and knew more about craft beer and rendering software than I did about a building’s structural logic. My job title was “designer”, which equated to a cartoonist for sleek boxes with windows.
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Bryan Hudson (2009)

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Licensure: The Long and Winding Road
Bryan Wendell Hudson
Licensed 2009
Written August 2009

I never really thought about what my story would be. I don’t want to be long winded but there’s so much to say… At any rate my, first experience with the Architectural Registration Exam (A.R.E.) came thru INOMA in ’93 on a Saturday test prep event. I actually got to practice the graphic section of the test. This was my first year in studio. I didn’t finish it but got a certificate for being the only student to show up and participate. It would be 9 years before I was eligible for the computerized version.

Fast forward to March 2002 to, NOMA founder, Wendell Campbell and Associates’ offices. This was the earliest stage of our current recession and the first time I was eligible to test. Site Planning was taken and failed. Since I was designing parking lots and structures I thought it would be a slam dunk. Not only did I fail, but I got laid off… I had to ask myself, do I eat and pay rent while looking for a job or study and find money to pay for the test. Well I chose to eat…(I’m sure a lot of you have dealt with this situation or may be now…) I didn’t take another test for sixteen months because in my new job that I started six months later, I was working 16hr days with no time to study. The next three exams I took with similar results to the first with the exception that the format changed again. I finally scored my first pass with Construction Documents in 2006. It would be another nine months before I passed yet a newer version of Site Planning. After that success, I finally started to get some confidence. In 2007, I had two more down with a promise made to one of the NOMAC members to be done by the following year’s NOMA conference.
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