Dr. Vibhuti Sachdev is presently working as Professor and Dean at Sushant School of Arts & Architecture, Gurgaon. With a Ph.D. from University of London, she has worked as a conservation consultant, writer and designer at many national and international firms. She has written four books and several articles on the subjects of Jaipur, traditional knowledge systems, Indian cities, and Indian modernities. Also, she was the design curator for the artwork of its pavilions, and the co-curator of the exhibition ‘Painted Pleasures’.

Sushant School of Arts & Architecture

What are the key factors that keep you connected with the education sector?

“Digging deeper into the indigenous knowledge systems”

As an architecture professional you are always on two boats, an academic as well as a practicing architect, and being a keen researcher I drifted towards education. I like sharing knowledge and building knowledge that helps me sustain throughout the research. I am very much anchored in learning about the traditional knowledge system and traditional wisdom, and how we can apply it today and through our perception, modernization and through our past. 

What can a student gain from studying in your institution?

“Diversity and cultural relatedness that binds us together”

We are the oldest civilizations of the world and we have a huge resource with us. Thousands of years of history and civilization and culture, we have our living and ancient traditions which we still see through our ancient cities. Also, we have a thriving diversity of culture, including geographical and contextual diversity. India as a place of education for youth has great advantage, we even barely started kind of addressing and really are making use of that because we have been busy chasing the western model. I think gradually we are waking up to the Indian advantage and hopefully we will steer our attention and effort towards creating our own models.

How far have you travelled in implementing the vision of your School?

“Making higher learning stronger and dynamic”

Measures of accountability for tracking systems of learning is what I spent about a couple of years just establishing in the school. I spend hours with the faculty just going through lesson plans, how to make a lesson plan, how to align learning outcomes with assessment and assignments. That is really craft work and you have to do that in order to get clarity on how you are teaching, how are you learning, and how the students are going to learn. We have a whole set of undergraduate, postgraduate and doctoral studies which makes the student experience very enriching because at all levels they can share experiences and knowledge. Also, I have been recently working on developing a multidisciplinary ecosystem for the fields, working with designers, and with planners to expose students from the very start. I am working towards formulating and formalizing the creative cluster for students so that they can learn with more innovativeness in their studies. 

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What are the biggest challenges you see in higher education?

“Student satisfaction and relevance of education with real life”

I think the challenges of higher education can be seen globally as everybody feels to focus on the relevance of education. What is the relevance, what is the applicability and of course the rapid digitization has made us confront that question much more clearly than it has ever before. Also, the students of course would want answers to what they are studying and why they are studying and how they are studying and for what they are studying? So, why, what and how are the basic questions that they would ask of anything they do. I think relevance has also broadened in the sense that we need to think of ways of instilling in them the basic human values which were actually done through communities.

How do you enhance the skills and expose students to real world challenges?

“Promoting creativity and regular interactions within the space”

Through our infrastructure and facilities, we make sure that there are enough interactive possibilities within the college where students can interact and talk, and come up with new creative ideas. We have a lot of clubs and student societies and also we have soft skills training which students take advantage of and they sign up for free courses. We use Gurgaon as a living lab, so we do a lot of city interventions, going out and reaching out to communities, identifying and working with administrative authorities in the city. So, there are a lot of the activities outside of the set curriculum that we do and that of course are always enriching and joyful.

Any insights about introducing new subjects like Vastuvidya in your school?

“Explanatory version of ancient and traditional systems”

I would broadly classify Vastuvidya as a traditional knowledge system and it is not just within the Hindu domain, it’s also in Mughal domain and others. Today, we are producing knowledge systems and so we must include heritage with a strong emphasis in our curriculum. We tell our students that no land is flat and every piece of land has layers of history, layers of communities which we have to respect and take forward. Vastuvidya is good knowledge of consecrated space, an entire system of architecture just not a quick urban fix. We have a module of traditional building materials in the curriculum.

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Any suggestions you would like to give to the aspiring architecture students?

“Work for a purpose and conserve your heritage”

In architecture your core concern is and should be about well-being of the planet, environment, energy utilization, recycling and sustainability. Believe in your values, cultural values and social values, that are going to take you a long way and there are learnings that you should apply in everything you do. Also, these will help you look beyond short term gains. Also, we all must safeguard and nurture the biggest asset, which is diversity in our country. We must protect it, nurture it and promote it. Any difference of opinion, culture, and thought must have room to grow. Don’t be passive absorbers of information, analyse things. Be a critical thinker.