NCBDS Archives Now at Texas Tech Southwest Collection (National Conference on the Beginning Design Student)

 

The National Conference on the Beginning Design Student (NCBDS) announced the creation of the Archive of NCBDS in partnership with the Southwest Collection (SWC) at Texas Tech University. The records and proceedings of NCBDS will now be searchable both online and in the SWC’s Holden Reading Room.

Since TTU’s earliest years, the Southwest Collection has archived the history of West Texas, the U.S. Southwest, and beyond. Its collections are available for public research purposes and include materials of regional, national, and international significance, including the archives of the Tau Sigma Delta Honor Society for Architecture and Allied Arts.

The NCBDS is a national, peer-reviewed scholarly gathering dedicated to the study and practice of beginning design education. For over 40 years, the Conference has provided a forum for design educators to present papers and projects and to hold discussions related to introductory design issues. Beginning with its 40th meeting in March 2025, NCBDS will continue to add the contents of its events to the SWC’s holdings.

The NCBDS collection will include not only decades of the organization’s annual programs and proceedings but also photographs, business records, audio/visual material, syllabi and other items documenting the NCBDS’s rich history.

“We are proud to serve as the archive of record for the NCBDS, and to preserve and make accessible the nationally significant student and professional architectural scholarship of the organization,” said Monte Monroe, the Southwest Collection Archivist and current Texas State Historian.

Tim McGinty, founder of NCBDS noted, “This is an important event in scholarship about teaching architecture especially because it will be in an online searchable format for the first time.”