This month’s #ArchiTalks topic is “3 favorite words”.

For about a week, I kicked around self-righteous posts about “small projects vs big projects,” which suddenly got shelved until an undetermined time.

The more I thought about the Young Architect audience, I decided I really needed to follow up with a blogpost I wrote 6 months ago, and my 3 words truly need to be:

How’s it going??

OK wait… Before you answer, let’s recap why I chose these 3 words.

Six months ago, I wrote a blogpost called Finish the Architect Exam in 2015 – The Only Resolution You Should Have.

OMG, Holy Crap!

The response I received from that single post was huge I must’ve gotten a gazillion emails.. The traffic has been one of my largest on any single Young Architect blogpost.

In that epic blogpost, I shared my story about how 2013 was my year to beat the ARE.  I defined how and why the ARE was blocking me from moving on with my life, and how I took extreme action to put an end of that. I encouraged ARE Candidates to “get sick and tired of being sick and tired” about the ARE’s.

I also ranted about how if you’re in the middle of taking the ARE’s, then you are quickly running out of time to not get caught in the middle of the ARE 5.0 transition.

The ARE 4.0 will be retired in June 2018. That’s 3 years away. According to NCARB’s data, it is taking an average of about 2.5 years to complete the ARE process.

To play it safe, I wouldn’t assume you are in the fewer than 2.5 years group, unless you are a brilliant test taker and have a track record of regurgitating massive amounts of textbook information.

The fact that you’re probably a great designer and received lots of praise in architecture school is completely irrelevant to studying and passing the Architecture Registration Exam.

I digress.

Nevertheless, six months has since passed.

A lot has happened in six months.

There have been several new developments in the ARE world since the beginning of the year. Let’s do a recap of what has happened.

• I decided to lock myself away all winter long and wrote what is essentially a self-help book about the ARE’s called How To Pass The Architecture Registration Exam. The book discusses mindset and study hacks and examines at length why most people do not complete the Architect licensing process. Definitely not another boring technical book filled with info to memorize.

• Charlie Klecha, the AIAS National President, decided that he was going to study for 7 weeks and take all 7 exams in 7 consecutive days. And he video-blogged all about it! He called it the #7in7 Challenge. I am hoping to reconnect with Charlie (after he recovers) for a post-exam interview.

• Part of Charlie Klecha’s goal for the 7in7 Challenge was to raise awareness for the Pass Scholarship, where the AIAS reimburses ARE Candidates for the cost of 1 exam—if they can pass 1 exam within 1 year of graduating architecture school.

• NCARB announced that it officially no longer endorses the term “Intern” for unlicensed architect, yet it has not provided a replacement term.

• I wrote reviews on the ARE study prep materials by Gang Chen and The ARE Advisor—two relatively newer guys on the ARE study prep scene.

• NCARB created a Google + Community for the ARE and started helping candidates with their vignettes.

• The AIA announced at the convention (I wasn’t there) that they are officially endorsing the Black Spectacles ARE product. This is the first time I have ever heard of the AIA endorsing any kind of ARE study product. They claim Black Spectacles is the first to offer online video ARE study materials, and I am not sure that is entirely true. Since there are soo many other ARE study materials available that have been around a lot longer, I wonder why Black Spectacles getting such attention from the AIA? Maybe someday I will pay their hefty membership fee to find out and write a review.

That’s a busy six months. I look forward to reporting the next six months; I have a feeling it will be busier now that we’re in the mad dash to wrap up ARE 4.0.

Soooo…. Hows it going?

This is the part of the blogpost where you answer…

Thanks for your input.

#ArchiTalks

Please take a few minutes to check out some of the other #ArchiTalk Bloggers from our friendly little circle of blogging Architects.

Enoch Sears – Business of Architecture
@businessofarch
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Bob Borson – Life of An Architect
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3 Words: Are. Blogs. Important.

Matthew Stanfield – FiELD9: architecture
@FiELD9arch
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Marica McKeel – Studio MM
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Never Give Up

Jeff Echols – Architect Of The Internet
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Lee Calisti, AIA – Think Architect
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i make art

Lora Teagarden – L² Design, LLC
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#ArchiTalks: I love it!

Andrew Hawkins, AIA – Hawkins Architecture, Inc.
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Jes Stafford – Modus Operandi Design
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I Am Listening

Cindy Black – Rick & Cindy Black Architects
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Michele Grace Hottel – Michele Grace Hottel, Architect
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Meghana Joshi – IRA Consultants, LLC
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Amy Kalar – ArchiMom
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My Three Favorite Words (Architalks #9)

Stephen Ramos – BUILDINGS ARE COOL
@sramos_BAC
My Three Favorite Words

Brian Paletz – The Emerging Architect
@bpaletz
I am in

Jonathan Brown – Proto-Architecture
@mondo_tiki_man
The Big Idea

Eric Wittman – intern[life]
@rico_w
my three favorite [hardest] words

Jeremiah Russell, AIA – ROGUE Architecture
@rogue_architect
three little words: #architalks