32 Matching Annotations
  1. Sep 2016
    1. provide more options for regulating learning and restoration cycles

      Where is the proof?

    2. Student-nature interactions during study breaks help restore attention (Felsten, 2009).

      Or perhaps the students get back to class or studying and are still distracted by what was going on while they were outside. Maybe they are more focused on the game they were playing or what they will do during their next break.

    3. Everyday campus spaces include other physical design features empirically associated with attention restoration –height of surrounding buildings -the fewer floors the better (Lindal & Hartig, 2013); extent of naturalness of views from windows -more natural the better (Matsuoka, 2010); and proximity-awareness of nearby nature impacts its use and effectiveness

      If students wanted to attend a college surrounded by nature, they would do so. If they wanted to be at a school in the city, like Georgia State, then that is where they would be. I feel like it is all about personal preference. Also, students don't tend to choose schools based on if they are close to nature or not, but how good the school is, what majors they have, and those sorts of things.

    4. For example, more than two-thirds of the Cornell University campus is open space

      Not all colleges have the space to proved open space, some only have a certain amount of land, which is often used for all the buildings the school requires.

    5. his in turn can benefit performance on other tasks, delay gratification, and perhaps even regulate levels of depression and stress. Therefore, providing opportunities for interactions that draw upon involuntary attention could be impactful on university campuses for attentional, fatigued students and their learning mechanisms. A wide range of natural settings in and around a college campus can play a role in student learning and engagement. Perceived greenness of different campus spaces can influence students’ perceived restorativeness in them

      Studies done about this would have been very informative in the part of the article, as here this is one of the few places that does not have citations. Have there been any studies done pertaining to this? Is there any evidence of this claim?

    6. “Attentive efficiency can be recovered after a period of rest and regeneration, obtained through the activation of involuntary attention” (Barbiero, Berto, Freire, Ferrando, & Camino, 2014, p. 32).

      The authors seem to believe that this restoration is only achieve by being in nature though.

    7. Interaction with nature, in particular, can help to maintain or restore cognitive function such as direct attention, problem solving, focus and concentration, impulse inhibition, and memory, which can become depleted from fatigue or with overuse (Hartig, et al., 2014; Kaplan & Kaplan, 1989)

      Who though, does nature help? Is it everyone, or a select group? Or does it perhaps differ from person to person?

    8. Therefore, this paper will define nature or natural environment as the… “physical features and processes of nonhuman origin that people ordinarily can perceive, including the “living nature” of flora and fauna, together with still and running water, qualities of air and weather, and the landscapes that comprise these and show the influences of geological processes” (Hartig, et al., 2014, p. 21.2).

      They don't define nature fully in their own words, I feel like they use so many references that their meanings don't come through clearly.

    9. and offer students an active, experiential education versus passive or theoretical learning.

      Why is in class learning considered "passive or theoretical?" You can do interactive activities in many classes in an classroom setting.

    10. Today the campus open space still remains a significant center for teaching and learning for students in natural resources management, sustainability/ecology, agriculture, forestry, etc. and more recently, a focus on environmental education and sustainable practices

      Sure this pertains to students with these specific types of majors, many of whom would choose to attend an agricultural based college, but what about students with other degree programs in mind?

    11. and new federal grant-supported scientific research programs created a frenzied need to invest in new facilities. College presidents approved filling existing campus open space with large, stand-alone structures that typically did not cohere or unify with the existing campus style (Turner, 1984). The inclusion of the automobile on campus resulted in parking lots claiming large areas of natural open space within a “ring road” type of plan, in which vehicles were mostly kept outside the pedestrian oriented campus core (Bowman, 2011, p. 27).

      So universities had to evolve as the world evolved, if they hadn't imagine how hard going to college would be. I know there are some schools that don't allow freshman to have cars with them on campus, imagine how difficult that could make school if it were a campus set apart from the city.

    12. Unlike the classic designs of America’s first institutions, the physical campus of the land grant university was designed to significantly contribute to student learning through its working farms, forests, arboretums, greenhouses, gardens

      It seems that the authors are in full support of classes that require such things as greenhouses and gardens and such, but what about classes that don'n need these things? What about math or government? I wonder what their opinions would be of classes that need only be inside.

    13. Many university founders desired to create an ideal community that was a place apart, secluded from city distraction but still open to the larger community

      I am not sure how they was a university secluded but open. It feels like a contradiction to me. Take Spartanburg's women's college Converse College for example. It is in a nice sized city, but not within walking distance of most places in the city because it is placed on the outskirts, so it is essentially secluded. To add to that, the school is surrounded by brick walls and elaborate fences. I have been there quite a few times, and I do not see how it is open to the community. This is unlike Georgia State, which is integrated into the city, making many things easily accessible for students and professors alike.

    14. Early American colleges and universities were self-sufficient and often built in rural locations with dormitories, dining halls and recreation facilities

      I feel as though the key word here is "early." Though this may have been true for universities years ago, it does not reflect many universities today. Universities are so much more than just dorms, dining halls, and rec centers now.

    15. Furthermore, increased technology use within today’s multitasking society is likely to hijack a student’s attentional resource placing her/him at risk of underachieving academic learning goals and undermining success at a university

      I think that this statement has two sides, and this article is only demonstrating the negative. Technology can be very distracting, that is true. It can also be so helpful. If one just says "I am going to do this work I have to do until I am done" and sticks to it, without browsing things unrelated to the work at hand, doing work is much easier than not having the availability that technology provides. To say technology only hinders is not accurate.

    16. Furthermore, increased technology use within today’s multitasking society is likely to hijack a student’s attentional resource placing her/him at risk of underachieving academic learning goals and undermining success at a university

      I can't disagree with this more. If i were to sit in my room our outside and attempt to study I would still get distracted by things around me. I can't imagine how hard studying is for someone who has ADHD. Technology can be distracting if it is not being used for the purpose of learning, but so can anything else surrounding one in the outside world. Not to mention most classes, even at the middle school level, require the use of technology in many day to day activities.

    17. Learning is a lifelong and year-round pursuit, which takes place throughout the campus, not just fragmented indoors in designated instructional spaces

      While it is true that learning does not take place only indoors, as some students do study outside, a majority of students study and do work inside and save the outdoors for recreational activities. Also, students tend to have access to such a wide variety of study spaces that them being indoors does not pose a problem.

    18. Americans expect a university campus to look different than other places (Gumprecht, 2007) and that the campus “expresses something about the quality of academic life, as well as its role as a citizen of the community in which it is located”

      Sure, students expect university's to differ from your average high school, but not necessarily in the way this article describes university's campuses. This article talks about a campus set apart from the community, something close to nature. How, in being set apart from the community, does this demonstrate "its role as a citizen of the community in which it is located?"

    19. Therefore, we propose that the natural landscape of a university campus is an attentional learning resource for its students.

      This is the thesis of the article, it can also be found in the conclusion.

    20. Kathleen G Scholl, Gowri Betrabet Gulwadi

      In the Schindler piece, the article has a list of credentials beside the authors name to help establish credibility, but here it does not. Though the are both professors, they do not provide any sort of ethos. Compare to Sarah Schindler, “Architectural Exclusion: Discrimination And Segregation Through Physical Design Of The Built Environment,” in Yale Law Journal.

  2. Aug 2016
    1. First, potential challengers, courts, and lawmakers often fail to recognize architecture as a form of regulation at all, viewing it instead as functional, innocuous, and prepolitical. Second, even if decision makers and those who are excluded recognize architecture’s regulatory power, existing jurisprudence is insufficient to address its harms.

      Though those who may fight against this form of control most likely do no see it as such, even if they did there are no laws in place to solve the problems caused by the regulation by architecture. If there was a way to change it, imagine how slow going the change would be, construction or deconstruction often takes months to years to be completed. That is not accounting for the time it takes for these things to be approved. So if architectural exclusion became more realized I wonder how they would go about fixing it.

    2. During the time that he was appointed to a number of important state and local offices

      Being appointed to a number of offices in the same general time frame often comes with larger amounts of power. You gain popularity and power through each office you are appointed to. That being said, it is likely that no would have challenged him even if they realized his intentions because of how much power he would have had.

    3. And although the law has addressed the exclusionary impacts of zoning ordinances and restrictive covenants, courts, legislatures, and most legal scholars have paid little attention to the use of less obvious exclusionary urban design tactics

      I wonder why those in power are not educated regularly on the built environment and the impact it can have. Perhaps it really is not very well known, or perhaps these people do not care how it alters the way of life of some so long as they continue being able to live their standard way of life.

    4. This hidden power suggests that lawmakers and judges should be especially diligent in analyzing the exclusionary impacts of architecture, but research demonstrates that they often give these impacts little to no consideration.

      This is another example of why lawmakers should be regularly educated on the impact of build environments so that they would take more time in examining how architecture excludes people. If every law maker in the country had to be educated on this type of exclusion it would come to a point where there could be no ignoring it. I wonder if they do not analyze this form of exclusion because of the lack of education on the subject, or for more sinister reasons.

    5. Such devices include physical barriers to access—low bridges, road closings, and the construction of walls—as well as the placement of transit stops, highway routes, one-way streets, and parking-by-permit-only requirements.

      These forms of architecture are meant to encourage (in a negative aspect) certain people to stay in designated areas. For example, one would not want to walk to an area so far from a bus stop that they may end up missing they last bus. This would make that person stay in the general are of the bus instead of venturing so far out. An example being say there is a public bus system in a town and you have to walk 10 minutes to get to it. Then, it only stops in an area that is near a dollar general, but you would prefer to shop at Bilo because it has a better selection. The problem is that you would need to walk 20 plus minutes to get to Bilo and would then have to worry about weather, missing the bus, and carrying all of your groceries back to the bus. This is just one small example. Does anyone know of any example of the walls being built, other than those given in the text?

    6. Moreover, as more low-income individuals move to the suburbs, they face continued difficulty accessing jobs in their communities due to the lack of transit options within suburban communities.

      Also, as more people move to these areas the jobs that are available in the area often diminish. The few jobs that were available will all but vanish and because of how difficult it is to find transportation the poverty in the area will increase, further causing people to fight harder for transportation to not be sent to the area because of how "bad" it is.

    7. While these concepts are foundational to planners and architects, only a small number of legal scholars—including Lessig—have begun to consider the built environment’s regulatory role

      It would seem that the affects of the built environment are still not widely known or understood. Those in places of power need to be able to better see what the built environment can do to certain people.

    8. At the request of white residents, in 1974 the city of Memphis closed off a street that connected an all-white neighborhood to a primarily black one

      Does anyone know of any instance of this happening around this area of Atlanta? Coming from a small town the rich neighborhoods are often separated from the poor ones by miles and miles and because many of the poor do not have cars they would have no reason to ever have a street closed off.

    9. Wealthy, mostly white residents of the northern Atlanta suburbs have vocally opposed efforts to expand MARTA into their neighborhoods for the reason that doing so would give people of color easy access to suburban communities

      My roommate was just commenting on how difficult it is for her to get to work because she does not have a car. She has to use the bus and train and walk. Even now built environments often restrict the lower middle class and poor.

    10. This design decision meant that many people of color and poor people, who most often relied on public transportation, lacked access to the lauded public park at Jones Beach.5

      I think Moses intentionally built a bridge so low leading to a park at a beach because in most places the walk to the beach is not a short one and during the heat of the summer one would be even more discouraged to go if the only choice they had was to walk because a bus could not drive under the bridge.

    11. he shaped much of New York’s infrastructure, including a number of “low-hanging overpasses” on the Long Island parkways that led to Jones Beach.3 According to his biographer, Moses directed that these overpasses be built intentionally low so that buses could not pass under them

      Moses used his power in a way that may not have been noticeable to the public or many people in places of power because it is such an ingenious way to exert control over certain people. Though his biographer knew why he built overpasses low, those who approved these building ordinances may not have know this or at the very least realized his reason behind building. Also, depending on the time this took place there may not have been such strict building codes as those that are in place today.

    12. the exclusionary built environment—the architecture of a place—functions as a form of regulation; it constrains the behavior of those who interact with it, often without their even realizing it.

      The design of the built environment restricts what those in the environment can do based on where in they live. It is meant to control who goes where, in this case, often without those who are being controlled noticing the means of their control.