Housing Connecticut: Developing Healthy and Sustainable Neighborhoods

Instructors:

Kate Cooney

Andrei Harwell

Alan Plattus

Anika Singh Lemar

About the Course

In this interdisciplinary clinic taught between the School of Architecture, School of Law, School of Management, and School of Environment and organized by the Yale Urban Design Workshop, students will gain hands-on, practical experience in architectural and urban development and social entrepreneurship while contributing novel, concrete solutions to the housing affordability crisis in Connecticut. Working in teams directly with local community-based non-profits, students will co-create detailed development proposals and architectural designs anchored by affordable housing, but which will also engage with a range of community development issues including environmental justice, sustainability, resilience, social equity, identity, food scarcity, mobility, and health. 

Through seminars and workshops with Yale faculty and guest practitioners, students will be introduced to the history, theory, issues, and contemporary practices in the field, and will get direct feedback on their work. Offered in partnership with the Connecticut Department of Housing (DOH) as part of the Connecticut Plan for Healthy Cities, student projects will center on community wealth building and equitable economic recovery in some of Connecticut’s most economically distressed neighborhoods, by proposing multi-sector, place-based projects that focus on housing, health, and economic development. Proposals will have the opportunity to receive funding from the State both towards the implementation of rapidly deployed pilot projects during the course period, as well as towards predevelopment activities for larger projects, such as housing rehabilitation or new building construction. Students in the course will be organized into multi-disciplinary teams including law, management, environment, and architecture students, who will ideate together and take on specific team roles, modeling real-world project development teams. Teams will be assigned to work with non-profit developers tackling development or redevelopment projects that include affordable housing. Facilities of the Yale Urban Design Workshop will be available to students of the course. Students may have the opportunity to continue their leadership in these projects following the end of the course, in a professional capacity, as they move towards implementation. Students will interact with their nonprofit partners, the Connecticut Commissioner of Housing, Connecticut Housing Finance Authority, and the Connecticut Green Bank.