Department of Architecture, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia

The Department of Architecture (Malay: Jabatan Senibina), Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) is the oldest school of architecture in Malaysia. It is one of the five schools under the Faculty of Built Environment. The origin of the school could be traced back to the early days of Kuala Lumpur Technical School, Brickfields Drive, Kuala Lumpur which was established in 1904. Its current reiteration was founded in 1975 in Jalan Gurney, Kuala Lumpur. The school later was moved to its current location in Skudai Campus, Johor during the mass migration into the larger, eventually the main campus of UTM, in 1987.

The Department of Architecture is the current, most used term when referring to the entity in its entirety. It is also referred to as the School for short. Previously, the School was the only department under the Faculty of Architecture. As more departments opened under its wings (Department of Town & Regional Planning, Department of Quantity Surveying, Department of Landscape Architecture), the name of the Faculty was changed to the Faculty of Built Environment.

The School is home to the Center of Built Environment in the Malay World (Malay: Pusat Kajian Alam Bina Melayu) or KALAM. The Centre was set up in June 1996 on the foundation of numerous intricate measured drawing works done by the students of the Department of Architecture out of concern for the rapid disintegration and elimination of Malaysia ‘s architectural heritage. With the accumulation of these works since 1975 (over 350 buildings documented), the research towards the identification, classification and analysis of the architectural heritage was established through undergraduate and post-graduate studies.

At the moment, the School is in the middle of a transition between the current 5 year Bachelor of Architecture (Part 2) programme to the new 3+2 programme. Until the next 3-4 years, it would seem as if the school is offering three different degrees: the Bachelor of Architecture, Bachelor of Science in Architecture (3 years Part 1) and Masters of Architecture (2 years Part 2). In actual fact, the Bachelor of Architecture is being phased out, and not taking anymore students.

All intakes beginning 2012 are as follows:

The Bachelor of Architecture (Hons) (5 Years) Programme in UTM have continued being accredited by the Lembaga Akitek Malaysia (LAM). The latest accreditation visit was successfully received in May 2011, where LAM have granted accreditation of Part 1 and Part 2 to the programme which expires 2015.

The next accreditation visit will review the new 3+2 programme (3 Years Bachelor of Science in Architecture + 2 Years Masters of Architecture). The current 5-year programme will be discontinued and currently no longer offered to new students.