Curriculum, Culture, and Challenges: an Interview with USU’s Lauren Johnson and Ryder McClaugherty
- Zach Curry and Sam Clemente
- 2 days ago
- 10 min read
Sam Clemente What are your guys' names, and do you guys have any involvement in landscape [architecture] or outside [of your department]?
Lauren Johnson I'm Lauren Johnson. I am the Vice President of Events for our ASLA student chapter here at Utah State. I'm a senior this year and will be graduating in the spring.
Ryder McClaugherty I'm Ryder McClaugherty, President of our chapter of ASLA. I am also a senior, but I'll be doing my master's degree, also in landscape architecture, next year. It's a concurrent program where instead of a four-year bachelor's, I’m getting a five-year bachelor's and master's. So, I have one more year, and I’m starting thesis work [this year]. As far as ASLA, we've got a really good group this year that is really dedicated and wants to make a difference within our chapter. We were talking about it today in our meeting that since COVID, we've been building it up every year. So it's finally coming into fruition a little bit more prominently.
Sam Clemente What is your thesis about?
Ryder McClaugherty I haven't picked out a specific topic yet, but I'm really interested in place identity and branding, and how it is integrated into the design process for LAs. [For example], looking into what types of media are effective for connecting people with the site.
Zach Curry Are you big into graphics?
Ryder McClaugherty For sure. A big point for me is to hit on graphics.
Zach Curry Is your program big on graphics?
Ryder McClaugherty I'd say yes and no.
Lauren Johnson We have a lot of classes where they encourage us and want us to use different graphic software. We get some foundational basics, but I think most of it, we go out of our way to dive deeper into things like graphics [styles] and learning other software.
Ryder McClaugherty [Our department] gives us a good basis to start with, but doesn't really take a deep dive into technical skills for graphics. It’s something that you pick up on your own. I don't know if it's like that for you guys…
Zach Curry We have a media class here and then after that they offer seminars for specific types of graphics. But other than that, you kind of have to learn on your own.
Ryder McClaugherty Yeah, it's very similar to how it is for us. And, with ASLA, especially for underclassmen, we try to do crash courses on InDesign or Photoshop etc. Our professors are here more for the design process and to guide us in that direction.
Lauren Johnson I'd add… I think something that's really great about our studios is we don't gatekeep – we really do try to collaborate. So if you see somebody that's working on a really cool graphic, you can approach that person and say, “hey, how are you making this?” And then usually people respond, “oh, this is the tool I use and how to do it.”
We have a pretty positive and collaborative culture within our studios.
I've grown [my graphic skills] so much even from knowing Ryder and his graphics.
Ryder McClaugherty Yeah, I could say the same thing about Lauren, you know, it's like everyone is just trying to be better, which is nice because I know it can be kind of competitive sometimes. And it still is, but in a good way.
We just finished our final project for our Urban Theory class last night, and it was a crazy push to see [the teams] and their graphics come together. It was really cool.
Zach Curry What's the Urban Theory class? We don't have anything like that here.
Ryder McClaugherty It's really… trial by fire, honestly. Our department is landscape architecture and environmental planning, so there's quite a bit of planning involved in some of our design studios. This one is heavily urban-centered.
Last year, [the senior class] did a project in →Baku, Azerbaijan. This year, we were assigned Salt Lake City, which is South [of Logan], where we were able to go for a site visit. But the emphasis of the project was implementing a green loop in Salt Lake because there's not a lot of open public green space. We were taking bits and pieces of Salt Lake and integrating them into the Green Loop.
Zach Curry Do a lot of your courses have an emphasis on Utah?
Ryder McClaugherty I think so. We've had a couple of sites outside of Utah. We had a residential development class project where everyone was assigned a different place to understand the bioclimatic factors of the environment, such as wind, sun, temperature patterns, etc., and how that affects design. My team was in Hawaii.
Lauren Johnson And my team was in Wyoming.
I think it also depends on the professor, as well. There are some professors like our professor, Caroline Lavoie, who bring unique perspectives from around the world. She's from Montreal, Canada, and takes sabbaticals to visit other places and bring some of that knowledge back [to our studios]. So, I think that's how they ended up [working] with students in Azerbaijan. [The senior class] actually won an award for it last year.
Sam Clemente You guys won an award?
Ryder McClaugherty The senior class from last year won an award for their Baku Urban Design project. Aishwarya Korkode (Class TA) compiled everyone's work, submitted it, and they won an award.
Sam Clemente We just had a school-wide lecture from a residential landscape architect (Mike Albert), and it's an under-represented group in landscape architecture.
Zach Curry Especially here, we don't tap into residential stuff. Probably one professor, I would say, Ethan McGory, is a licensed residential landscape architect.
Outside of that, it's big moves and planning in our studio classes. So, we don't really get a chance to do anything small like that. I think that's really cool.
Sam Clemente Is that three-year program supposed to let landscape architecture be more accessible for students?
Ryder McClaugherty I think so, yeah. One of the biggest general classes at USU is Intro to Landscape Architecture. If you're taking that class, you're getting exposure early, and someone may decide to switch their major because they enjoyed that class.
Lauren Johnson There are quite a few non-traditional students, so they [the department] usually try to help students who transfer from other majors to be able to have a shot of getting out into the career field without spending too much time in school for their undergrad.
Ryder McClaugherty I know one person who came in as a “true freshman” who did it in the three-year track, but [the three-year track] is almost always someone that's has switched majors.
Sam Clemente Is there any fun fact at the university level that relates to landscape architecture?
Lauren Johnson The Landscape Architecture program is recognized [from ASLA] as the 13th oldest in the nation (established in 1939). I used to be an academic advisor for exploratory students, so that was one of the facts that I would always tell them about our landscape architecture program.
Ryder McClaugherty It's definitely been around for a while. Our department used to operate out of Old Main, which is the oldest building on campus. Now, we are on the outskirts of campus, in the Fine Arts Visual building.
Lauren Johnson We're the land grant institution, so a lot of our projects are based on a lot of community engagement through USU Extension. We've done a lot of programs that are spread across Utah and have projects within the community.
Next semester, the seniors will be doing a capstone, where we will do a charrette with the whole department. The class is about leadership, but they usually collaborate with the USU extension office, where a lot of outreach and community aspects are represented. So, we do a lot of projects in a lot of different places around Utah to help out.
Ryder McClaugherty We're in Logan, which is about an hour and a half North of Salt Lake City. The last two years we've done capstone, the project was located in Bear Lake. Bear Lake is very, very [populated] in the summers and is [nearly vacant] in the winter. Last year’s project was focused on Garden City, specifically on site design, taking principles that we learned from the year before. The year before was more planning-oriented, focusing on the Bear Lake Valley.
We're not completely sure what our capstone is this year, but three years ago, we did the Great Salt Lake. This is a big issue in the state of Utah. If the lake dries up, then all of the settled toxins at the bottom will create dust storms, forcing most of the population in the Wasatch Front to move out. The lake is currently sitting at 34 out of 100 on a scale of collapse to healthy.
Sam Clemente Do you guys interact with a lot of the environmental planning students or share classes?
Ryder McClaugherty The Environmental Planning (EP) studio is a lot smaller. In addition to this, our department has a separate Residential Landscape Design and Construction (RLDC) degree. There are only 10 or so students per cohort in both EP and RLDC.
Sam Clemente Is it an associate's degree?
Lauren Johnson No, it's a bachelor's. It's residential landscape design and construction. It's a non-matriculating program, and it’s more focused on design-build [and maintenance].
Zach Curry Would you say Utah, as a state and a community, values landscape architecture as a field?
Ryder McClaugherty That's hard to say. We're in the West, so development tends to be the priority.
Lauren Johnson It seems that everybody in Utah has a, “oh, we'll do it ourselves” kind of attitude.
They think they know what landscape architecture is, but they don't really know what landscape architecture is when their basement is flooding because of the DIY project they did in their backyard.
Since I've been working in Salt Lake City, I've noticed that people in the city do recognize [landscape architecture] more. Depending on where you're at, the recognition changes. There's a lot of new projects that are up and coming in Utah that are major investments.
Utah is definitely growing so I can see Utah becoming a hotspot in the future.
Ryder McClaugherty Yeah, I agree. With the Wasatch Front, where Salt Lake City is positioned, landscape architecture is bigger than you think. [The urban core of] Salt Lake City is not very big, but across the Wasatch Front, there are 3 million people. Utah State is located in a small agricultural town, sitting North of the Wasatch Front, so I think up here, we’re not seeing as many people valuing landscape architecture. But on the Wasatch Front, I think we'll start to see more and more projects in the future.
Zach Curry I would say it's similar to Columbus. We have really poor planning, and we don't really get a lot of new parks. There’s a metro park system, but they've tapped that dry. I don't think there's going to be any new projects for a while.
Sam Clemente It's a handful of reuse and co-use projects–like turning alleys into parks…sort of like a Rust Belt city, Columbus is.
Zach Curry It’s sort of on the edge of the Rust Belt. There's the Scioto Autobahn Park, which is an old train yard that got turned into wetland restoration.
Sam Clemente And then there's another one. I think it was also MKSK that turned a quarry into a quarry trail. They turned a quarry, where you guys probably know what it is, but they blow stuff up in it and then it becomes like a water detention basin, but they transformed it into a park.
Zach Curry Yeah, now it's parked in really expensive apartments…
I have one more question actually. OSU just got hit with the Senate Bill One, which is limiting what can be taught in a classroom– politics, global warming– huge for our fields. Do you feel a threat to your program like that at all in Utah?
Sam Clemente And do you feel like any of that context has ties with what you're learning?
Ryder McClaugherty I mean… if it's affecting your studio, it's probably going to affect our studio. I haven't really heard anything specifically affecting what we're learning or what's going on politically, to be honest. Since we are a land-grant institution, there are a few things that we can't say anymore.
Our department hosts Speaker Series every semester, where we have professionals come in and speak about their journey in landscape architecture. At the beginning of each Speaker Series, we always acknowledge that [Utah State] sits on indigenous lands. We’re not allowed to say that anymore–we can't even acknowledge what land the university sits on, which is ridiculous.
Zach Curry I hope it doesn't get worse. Morale gets low with stuff like that here. Entire protests and walkouts that we had.
Ryder McClaugherty How do your professors feel about that, changing the content of their courses?
Zach Curry There was a student march from the OSU campus to the statehouse because Columbus is the capital. It's just right down the main street and our professors canceled class to make sure that we could attend.
Ryder McClaugherty That's sweet.
Lauren Johnson Yeah, that is awesome.
Zach Curry So, there is the sense that we want to keep this curriculum because it has gotten us far with things like accreditation and great graduation rates. It's a combination of factors from the government and also our university president is not the greatest…
Lauren Johnson We've just got a new university president…
Ryder McClaugherty We've only ever had 18 presidents and we've had three since we've been here.
Lauren Johnson There's been a lot of changes. We were the College of Agriculture and Applied Sciences, but now we are the Quinney College of Agriculture & Natural Resources.
Ryder McClaugherty Budget cuts basically led us to combine colleges.
Zach Curry That's what's happening with Nebraska right now.
Ryder McClaugherty We definitely resonated with that. Our program is big enough that it won't be cut, but when we saw what was happening to Nebraska, Lincoln, we knew we wanted to use our platform to support them. It was surprising to see the amount of money the university would save from cutting that program versus the other programs at UNL.
Zach Curry Yeah. They had 100% graduation rate.
Sam Clemente It was the only accredited school in Nebraska.
Ryder McClaugherty That's the thing; that area really needs that kind of program. To have that option in that part of the US is so important.
Zach Curry Well, thank you guys so much for talking to us.
Ryder McClaugherty Appreciate it.
Lauren Johnson Yes, thank you!