Every year passionate and dedicated students of architecture gather in four regions across the United States. This year Woodbury University had the pleasure to host the West Quad Conference of the American Institute of Architecture Students in Los Angeles. The West Quad consists of ten of the most western states with over thirty schools, seventeen of which were able to make it this year to LA. This would not have been accomplished without the support of the Woodbury University, the School of Architecture, Planning Team, our Advisor, the AIA LA chapter of Emerging Professionals, and countless others not named.
The first day of the conference was rainy and gray but the weather soon became bright and sunny with the amount of positivity our members brought with them to every event. Energy flowed from the early morning COP Meeting to the late night Bar Crawls in Downtown Los Angeles. The conference took the students all over the Los Angeles area to see and experience the LA sights. All but a couple sessions were filled.
Our goal and primary task was to make this an awesome experience for the conference attendees. From the number of positive comments through social media, texts, emails, and in person from students, staff, professionals, and the speakers we would say this conference was a success. One planning team member overheard, not one, but a few students say that their LA River Bike Ride session may have been the funniest session in all the sessions, ever! Or something close to that.
As a planning team, we had no prior experience coordinating an event of this size. Nor did we have any idea on how to start it. One student a year ago asked our Conference Chair what makes our chapter qualified, and frankly, the answer to that question was nothing. Nothing besides the passion and dedication to show our colleagues and friends our beautiful city and to learn and grow in the process. When a group of dedicated and passionate students comes together, experience or no experience, great things can happen. This is how our team was able to become better communicators, collaborators, planners, and overall better architectural students. So we thank each and every attendee of our West Quad Conference this year and look forward to the next one.
Wishing everyone the Best from the West,
West Quad Conference 2018 Planning Team
Tony Lopez
Jodi Balster
Talal Alharbi
Genevieve Enriquez
Andrew Barraza
Tannaz Rouhi
