This year I celebrate my tenth year as a licensed architect. In 2010, when I was finishing my exams, I was curious about the statistical trends of licensure for African-American architects. Since that year, I have partnered with Dennis Mann, one of the editors of the Directory of African American Architects, to analyze the numbers.
As of April 2020, an assessment of this year proves the obvious: 2020 has been a strange and unusual ride so far (ref: coronavirus). No matter what may have happened over the course of 2019, it in no way compares to how 2020 will be remembered. Last year was not as monumental as this year portends to be when thinking about the corner of life related to architecture and licensure. In 2019, licensure candidates were fully engaged in version 5.0 of the NCARB’s (National Council of Architectural Registration Boards) ARE® (Architect Registration Exam®). While study materials remained lacking, candidates were figuring it out by getting advice from version 5.0 early testers and jerry-rigging 4.0 study materials to work for 5.0. The economy was humming along and many candidates were the beneficiaries of firms funding their testing fees and also, at many larger firms, study materials.
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| Number of ARE Completions (NCARB) |
Is one of the downsides of a positive economy that people are too busy with work to fit in taking the ARE® exams? After multiple-year increases in candidates finishing their exams, NCARB saw a 2% decrease in the number of candidates that completed the ARE in 2018 according to their annual report released in June 2019. Even though the number is still high looking at the ten-year history, NCARB concluded that “the rush to test [because of the change from version 4.0 to 5.0] led to a reduction in pass rates,” meaning that they thought that candidates were unprepared for the new version.
Likewise, the positives in the economy did not translate into an increase in the number of African-Americans that earned their architecture license. According to the Directory of African American Architects (DAA)**, 39 African-Americans were licensed in 2019. This 46% decrease is sharply down from 71 in 2018 and staggering compared to the 2% decrease NCARB saw. If we believe NCARB’S conclusion, then the new exam version seems to be greatly affecting the pass rates of this group much more than others.
From Jordan Rhodes, who earned her license in 2019,
“Out of a group of 8 co-workers or friends I know who were actively testing, I’m the only one that finished their exams. 2 had children. 2 bought a house. 5 completed job searches and got new jobs. These are costly things, either financially or time-consuming. At least 4 of my group decided to pursue those other life milestones after receiving multiple fails on exams. I don’t blame them it is demoralizing and exhausting. How can we encourage each other through the fails? How do we express the value added of a license in good times and bad?”
These sentiments echo the findings of the Equity by Design survey results identifying major life events as pinch points that created forks in the licensure path where people may get detoured. In a positive economy, candidates may see having children, buying housing, and moving to a better job as a bigger priority than completing their exams. Last year I noted that “unemployment remains low so people may feel like they can get [good] jobs without being licensed.” Add on to that the challenge of navigating a new version of the exams and some candidates may pause for a year or longer in their process.
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| ARE Completions by Race/Ethnicity (NCARB) |
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| AXP Completions by Race/Ethnicity (NCARB) |
Looking at NCARB’s demographic data, we see that the number of non-white candidates completing the ARE® has hovered around 20% of the total per year over the last 10 years.
The DAA had a total of 2,306 living African-American licensed architects at the end of 2019. Broken down by gender, the registry had 470 women and 1836 men*. This number is woefully small considering that NCARB reported that a whopping 4,981 candidates completed their exams just in 2018.
African American licensure numbers show steady, increase, but still hover around 2% of the approximate 115,316 total architects licensed in the US. We have a long way to go before the number is on par with the population of the African-American population in the US currently at 14%. Additionally, the percentage has remained around 2% despite NCARB data showing that all exam completions for architects has nearly doubled in that same time period.
One number that continues to show positive increases is completions for the AXP (Architectural Experience Program®), the program to track internship hours. NCARB shows completions by non-whites has increased 11% over the last ten years, from 23% to 34%, so eventually, that should translate to more non-white candidates completing the ARE and getting licensed.
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Share your thoughts in the comments below or email me.
Read the previous annual posts:
2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009
References:
- NCARB by the Numbers, trends of internship, exam, and licensure+
- The Directory of African American Architects.**
- Equity by Design [EQxD]
**Note: listings in the directory are self-reported and continuously updated. Check the website for current totals.
*The DAA does not currently have the option for those that want to report non-binary gender identifiers.
+NCARB releases their data for the previous year in June of the following year.