University of Notre Dame 91��Ƶ of Architecture students have teamed up with Building Tomorrow, Inc. (BT) to design, fund and build a much-needed school in the Kiboga district of Uganda, Africa. They leave this week to begin construction.

BT is an international social-profit organization that encourages youth philanthropy to build educational infrastructure projects for under-served children in sub-Saharan Africa. BT currently works in Uganda, identifying areas with the greatest number of children with the least access to a primary school.

Notre Dame’s involvement began last year when fifth-year 91��Ƶ of Architecture student Elijah Pearce attended a talk by BT president, George Srour, and decided to recruit fellow students to join their efforts. Over the next year Pearce, with the generous funding of Matthew and Joyce Walsh, brought together a group of six Notre Dame Architecture students to build the new school.

“With this project we were acting on two fronts,” Pearce said. “We were trying to fundraise for a school in an underserved area of Uganda, and we were also looking, as architects, to see how we could improve the school’s design.”

The students’ design takes advantage of cross breezes to cool the building naturally. It is also oriented for optimal solar angles, minimizing the need for heating. The school’s roof serves to collect water, and vent details have been added to the walls to enhance the design visually while improving the overall ventilation system. Perhaps most significantly, the students will be making and building with newly-adopted interlocking soil-stabilizing block (ISSB), bricks they will produce on site entirely from local materials that reduce the need for mortar. Local climate and sustainability informs every aspect of the students’ design.

The school, to be named the Academy of Kyeitabya, will be BT’s ninth in Uganda. Once open, the BT Academy of Kyeitabya will join the nearly-completed BT Academy of Sentigi as the second location supported by Notre Dame.

When talking about the project, the students emphasize the unique opportunity to give back through architecture.

“We’ve been given a tremendous educational gift, and can now make a practical application of what we’ve learned here at Notre Dame,” said fifth-year student Mallory Meecham.

Adds fellow student Tim Reidy, “Nobody felt obligated to take part in this project. Nobody needed course credits. But we all felt obligated through our conscience.”

Updates from the students’ time in Kyeitabya are available online at .

From: Karen Voss, kvoss@nd.edu, 574-631-2872

The University of Notre Dame 91��Ƶ of Architecture will host a lecture and exhibition highlighting the Acropolis Restoration Project on Monday (March 1) at 4:30 p.m. in the auditorium and gallery in Bond Hall. The events are free and open to the public.

Lena Lambrinou, an architect and archeologist with the Acropolis Restoration Service, will open the event with her lecture, “Preserving the Parthenon: Principles and Implementation.” Lambrinou will discuss the ongoing restoration efforts at the Parthenon, with emphasis on techniques for strengthening damaged parts of the building, reinstituting retrieved fragments, and incorporating new architectural elements where necessary. Lambrinou will also discuss her most recent work on the Parthenon’s north colonnade and plans for interventions on the west wall of the cella.

The concurrent exhibition “Photographs of the Athenian Acropolis: The Restoration Project” is a collection by chief Restoration Project photographer Socratis Mavrommatis that documents the interventions and transformations of the Acropolis monuments since 1975. The exhibit was inaugurated in 2002 at Athens’ renowned Benaki Museum, and has since traveled to Thessaloniki, Brussels, Paris, Rome and London. The North American tour was organized by the Thomas J. Walsh Art Gallery at Fairfield University. The exhibition will be on display from March 1 through March 29 in the Bond Hall Gallery.

Additional information is available by visiting .

Contact: Karen Voss, 91��Ƶ of Architecture, 574-631-2872, voss.18@nd.edu

Paul Goldberger, architecture critic for The New Yorker, will give a talk titled “Why Architecture Matters” at 4:30 p.m. Feb. 1 (Monday) in 104 Bond Hall at the University of Notre Dame 91��Ƶ of Architecture.

The event is free and open to the public and a book signing will follow the lecture. Please note that this lecture is rescheduled from its original date in November.

A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Paul Goldberger has written The New Yorker’s celebrated “Sky Line” column since 1997. He began his career at The New York Times, where in 1984 he received the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism, the highest award in journalism.

He is the author of many books, including “Why Architecture Matters,” published in 2009 by Yale University Press, and “Building Up and Tearing Down: Reflections on the Age of Architecture,” a collection of his essays published in 2009 by Monacelli Press. His talk will engage new material presented in these books. Copies of each will be available for purchase.

Goldberger lectures widely around the country on the subject of architecture, design, historic preservation and cities. He appears frequently on film and television to discuss these issues, and is now at work on a program on the architect Benjamin Latrobe for PBS. He serves on the jury for the Richard H. Driehaus Prize, a $200,000 prize awarded annually for traditional architecture and urbanism administered through the University of Notre Dame.

Contact: Karen Voss, 91��Ƶ of Architecture, kvoss@nd.edu, 574-631-2872