MSU one of eight universities receiving funding from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine

STARKVILLE, Miss.—A collaborative design studio and an interdisciplinary research seminar at ��Ƶ together are recipients of an almost $750,000 award from the Gulf Research Program of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to investigate complex challenges in the Gulf region.

to receive funds, MSU’s Mississippi Gulf Coast Collaborative Studio is one of five studios that participated in the initial pilot phase of the Gulf Futures Design Studio program.

Gulf Coast Community Design Studio Director David Perkes said students are better able to understand coastal ecology and engage with community stakeholders when they travel to the Gulf Coast, and the NASEM award provides that support.

MSU architecture and landscape architecture talk with community stakeholders — MSU architecture and landscape architecture students have traveled to the Gulf Coast to engage with local stakeholders and to better understand coastal ecology as part of their research investigating complex regional challenges. (Photo submitted)

Architecture and landscape architecture majors in the Mississippi Gulf Coast Collaborative Studio, led by faculty in MSU’s School of Architecture and Department of Landscape Architecture, have spent the year exploring ways to respond and adapt to ongoing struggles of Mississippi Gulf Coast communities.

“Working in the historical neighborhood of East Biloxi, the goal of the fall studio was to reimagine neighborhood areas and develop mixed-use building typologies in underutilized or abandoned sites focusing on community resiliency and affordable housing,” said Associate Professor Silvina Lopez Barrera, who served as architecture studio coordinator in the fall.

Two senior architecture students, senior Arturo Hernandez of Winston Salem, North Carolina, and Cole Arrington of Bay Springs, recently presented their research at the Gulf Scholars Program Annual Conference at the University of Alabama.

School of Architecture Associate Professor Jacob Gines led the interdisciplinary research seminar, which included 12 architecture students.

“The seminar provided students with the opportunity to engage with and learn from Gulf Coast Research Scholars, Gulf Coast community partners and other individuals whose research and work focuses on issues of environmental change, resilient communities, adaptive landscapes, human geography, socio-economic impact and other related topic areas,” Gines said.

School of Architecture Director and F.L. Crane Professor Karen Cordes Spence said receiving the grant is an honor.

“Through this funding, our school and university will be able to serve the Mississippi Gulf Coast through deep, interdisciplinary examinations of how to live and thrive in harmony in this unique place,” she said. “It is a special region that is both rich and fragile, and learning how to design within it builds strong design skills.”

For more on MSU’s College of Architecture, Art and Design, visit .

For more about the landscape architecture department, visit .

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