Michael Speaks has a Ph.D. in literature from Duke University; he has taught in the graphic design department at the Yale School of Art and in the architecture departments at Harvard University, Columbia University, Parsons School of Design and The Berlage Institute in Rotterdam; he is the founding editor of Polygraph, and has been the senior editor at ANY magazine in New York, where he was also the series editor for "Writing Architecture," published by the MIT Press. He has published and lectured internationally on art, architecture, urban design and scenario planning. Speaks is a contributing editor for Architectural Record, and serves on the editorial advisory board of A+U (Japan) and on the advisory board for the Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York. And he is among the dozens of accomplished academic stars being recruited to the University of Kentucky as the institution strives for a spot among the nation's top 20 research universities.
What entices Speaks to walk away from the prestige of leading the Metropolitan Research and Design post-graduate degree at the Southern California Institute of Architecture in Los Angeles to relocate in Lexington as dean of the University of Kentucky College of Design? Read on. His reason goes straight to the heart of anxieties over Gov. Beshear's proposed deep cuts in state funding of higher-education.
"What made me interested, to be perfectly honest, in applying for the job and in pursuing the deanship, was the proposal by Lee Todd, which is the Top 20 Business Plan and the initiative that was ultimately, as I understand it, even supported by state legislation," explained Speaks in a telephone interview as he was preparing to depart L.A. for his new home and position in Lexington.
"I have to say, the thing that excites me most now and excited me then is that you really do not find that kind of initiative; I haven't seen anything like that anywhere else," explained this poster child of sorts for the caliber of talent UK is attempting to recruit in its mandated effort to advance its national stature by the year 2020. "So that kind of support of innovation, for entrepreneurship, for redefining in a cross disciplinary what design is and what it can do both as a discipline, as a practiced profession, but also for the city and for the commonwealth, I think is extremely exciting. So that kind of support from the top down is what really got me excited to come."
Speaks puts a face (and a killer vita) on a concern raised by UK President Lee Todd in the Jan. 25 edition of Business Lexington. Dr. Todd voiced worries that Gov. Beshear's call for severe cuts in higher-education spending would not be lost on potential faculty recruits. "Just a conversation of a cut of this magnitude in Kentucky higher education is going to put questions in the minds of the people we're trying to recruit and bring here," Todd explained. "It may put questions in the minds of the people who have already decided to come here. We've recruited faculty this year from Harvard, Yale, MIT, Cornell, Wisconsin and other top universities. They came here because of support for our business plan and the momentum that they felt the university had."
Many in the on- and off-campus architecture and design communities were delighted to hear of Speaks' appointment because they had become aware of his devotion to the concept of sustainability. "Sustainability is extremely important, both for cities and for architects and certainly for school curriculum," he said. "My view of sustainability is not simply of matter of greening, but of making cities or buildings reusable, transformable over time. That can work with historic preservation, that can work with larger planning efforts. But at a curricular level, I think the real target - and this I believe we'll see occur in the next five, six, seven, eight years - is for sustainability to be so imbedded in curriculum that you don't see it."
"That's a good sign," noted Richard Levine, co-director of UK's Center for Sustainable Cities. "Not everyone understands that. Someone that does would act differently from someone who doesn't understand that the future of the university, of the city and of the state lies in how well it responds to the major crisis of our time, which is sustainability."
Equally as intriguing to Speaks is Lexington's current transformative mood and environment. Mayor Jim Newberry and Todd have a collaborative relationship, and among their shared goals is a seamless integration of campus and downtown. Speaks brings into that atmosphere an extensive network of key contacts and resources in the world of urban design. "There are resources, there are talents, there are faculty and there is an administrative interest already existing at the university and certainly at the city level to make the university and to make the city into something very special. The kind of connections I think that people are hopeful that I might be able to make are connections not only from the outside-in, but also from the inside-out. My real ambition for the College of Design is to engage in really regional, national and global conversations with the best colleges and schools of design in the U.S. and in the world, and to make the University of Kentucky College of Design part of the conversation."
"Michael has an almost iconic status within the academic and the design professions," said Vice Mayor Jim Gray. "He'll bring world-class thinking to UK, introduce the world to Lexington and Lexington to the world."