The American Indian Housing Initiative: Marking Turk Under the Big Sky

The American Indian Housing Initiative (AIHI) is anational collaboration between Penn State and theUniversity of Washington with Chief Dull KnifeCollege and the Housing Authority on the NorthernCheyenne Reservation. The program integratesresearch and education in the area of sustainablecommunity building practices with hands-oninterdisciplinary experiences for students, facultyand design professionals. The program focuses onthe housing crises endemic to American Indianreservations, and promotes economically and4environmentally sustainable design strategiesincluding loadbearing strawbale construction. Theprogram concentrates students and faculty in thedesign disciplines of architecture, architecturalengineering and landscape architecture, but alsoincludes students with diverse backgrounds such asnutrition, biology and education. The yearlong,three-part design-build service learning coursepivots on a summer building program on tribal landswhere faculty and students are joined bypractitioners in the construction of housing andcommunity facilities. Joining innovation inarchitectural and engineering design with projects ofsocial consequence, this program broadens allparticipants understanding of environmentallyresponsive technologies through research and theinclusion of an under-represented populationthrough the application of that research. In acomplex weave, AIHI binds the academy and theprofession, students and alumni, and theeducational mission of the participating schools withthe needs of the culturally rich Northern Cheyennecommunity.Funding from the National Science Foundation (andother sources) supports an active programmodeling, testing and monitoring the performance ofthe strawbale building enclosure. The presentationwill include initial technical research results ofstructural testing and thermal monitoring, currentlyunderway, of a recently constructed house.Architectural detailing and construction sequencingaccommodating the unique compression conditionsof the loadbearing strawbale will be discussed. Thetechnical and design opportunities presented byconstruction joints between thick wall “wet”strawbale construction with “dry” pre-fabricatedsystems including structural insulated panels andinsulated concrete formwork will be featured in thepresentation.

Volume Editors
Marilys R. Nepomechie & Robert Gonzalez

ISBN
0-935502-54-8