Architecture Will Be Focus at New Milwaukee High School

By Joe Grundle

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee is no stranger to developing charter schools with Milwaukee Public Schools, but a new high school to open this fall will have a decidedly pointed focus.

The small urban high school will be an early architectural school with curriculum formed by UWM’s School of Architecture and Urban Planning.

On Jan. 13, the high school’s planners will take part in the Third Annual Milwaukee New Small High School Enrollment Fair at The Shops of Grand Avenue mall, an event where prospective students can check out alternative options to larger MPS high schools.

“This is our first event and will really be our first chance to meet interested students and talk to them,” said Bill Huxhold, an urban planning professor at UWM and member of the high school planning committee.

“There should be a lot of students coming through looking to enroll.

“Once news of the school hit the street, we got a lot of interest from teachers who knew of students who would be a good fit.”

The high school, called the School of Urban Planning and Architecture, was planned by a team that included UWM faculty, students, alumni and staff from university institutions and research centers, high school teachers and a high school student.

The planners were awarded $10,000 in federal charter grant money from the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction in December.

“Things are really happening quickly,” said Huxhold. “We are well into the planning phase of the curriculum and the administrative requirements of MPS.”

Community involvement requiredSUPAR will employ architecture and urban planning themes to impart skills and knowledge relevant to today’s workplace but will also be founded on community building and social justice ideals.

It will serve Milwaukee’s central city youth, as well as link UW- M to Milwaukee communities.

“Even in our university activities, community projects are intimately connected with the education experience,” Huxhold said. “We just wanted to incorporate that at the high school level, which in turn, makes it a natural feeder into the university.”

Using project-based curriculum, experiential learning opportunities and linkages with the professional planning and architecture worlds, students will graduate with problem-solving, critical thinking, effective-communication and leadership skills.

A central focus of the school will be geographic information systems, an information technology that imparts spatial analysis and database management skills, as well as computer design programs like AutoCAD.

“University alums have already come up with 50 different real- world project ideas in which the students will learn different aspects of urban planning and architecture,” Huxhold said.

All subjects taughtTo meet MPS requirements, SUPAR also has to teach all standard high school subjects, not solely architecture. But under the curriculum, students will learn math, science, art, literature, foreign language and social studies through community projects, which they can identify on their own according to their interests.

For example, students could work on community health issues, how to map crime hot spots in the city, or work with a neighborhood group to locate a site for a food pantry.

“We don’t expect all the students to go to college,” noted Huxhold. “But at least those that choose not to, we will have taught them that they can become community-involved adults with or without a college degree.

“They will have the knowledge of what they can do to improve their community.”

SUPAR is the brainchild of UWM Adjunct Assistant Professor Kirk Harris, who was concerned about the lack of minority professionals locally and students enrolled in the urban university’s architectural school.

Initially doubted by colleagues, Harris first garnered interest in the project from UWM students by offering a course designed to develop the school.

Planning grant receivedThe class then worked out a proposal for a school partnership with MPS and applied for a planning grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. It was successful to the tune of $50,000.

“That got us off the ground, and for the last 12 months we’ve been meeting often to advance the plan,” said Huxhold, who called Harris the planning committee’s “spiritual leader.”

SUPAR will use MPS-licensed teachers and initially start with only freshman and sophomore classes before ramping up enrollment to create all four. There will be no tuition, so funding will come primarily from private resources.

“We are aware of companies and foundations interested in contributing to help equip the school and are looking for more funding to beef things up,” said Huxhold.

Huxhold said the team will choose a location for the school by the end of January and that it will likely wind up on the eastern side of the city, although sites on both the northeast and southeast sides are being considered.

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