Cith Skelcher

Joint Director of MArch

Disability Liaison Officer

Head of MArch Admissions

Joint Equality Diversity + Inclusion Lead

c.a.skelcher@sheffield.ac.uk

+44 7746 980271

I joined the Sheffield School of Architecture in 2012 teaching on the MSc in Sustainable Architecture Studies postgraduate course. I am now in my fourth year as Year 2 Programme Director.

I am also Partner and Architect at Pennine Sustainability, a multi-disciplinary practice based in Hebden Bridge, where I specialise in public projects and participatory processes. We champion a broader understanding of sustainable design through an integrated, collaborative approach.

I trained at the University of Cambridge after which I spent ten years working with Cottrell and Vermeulen Architecture, where I ran a range of projects, both new build and refurbishment, including a 32 unit student community for Clare College Cambridge and a Sure Start Children’s Centre in Bermondsey.

More recently I have been working with an inner city community in Birmingham to try to breathe new life into a decaying but much loved youth centre that was purpose-built in the 60s by Brutalist Architect John Madin.

Inclusive co-production

Inclusive Learning Toolkit, 2023 - ongoing

This 'project in development' is being co-produced by students and staff from the Sheffield School of Architecture to support and promote a culture of inclusive learning within and beyond the school as part of our ongoing work as a 'social school of architecture’. We acknowledge that being an inclusive school is very much a ‘work in progress’ and that there is much work still to be done.Taking the format of a googlesite, the toolkit includes our inclusive learning manifesto, which articulates a collective understanding of what inclusive learning means for the Sheffield School of Architecture. The manifesto is structured as a set of values and a forward looking agenda. A library of best practice case studies and downloadable learning templates then serves as a resource to distribute responsibility for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion within the school, empowering staff and students alike with the tools to build and sustain an inclusive learning environment that reflects our values. Our future ambition for the site is for it to become an open platform sharing ideas across schools and this would be the first step in moving towards that.Toolkit, EDI, Pedagogy, Participation, Critical pedagogy, Wei Chan Chia and Cith Skelcher

Student project awards

ASCA Education Prizes, 2023 - Ongoing

Recognising that students are influenced by what the school outwardly recognises as excellent performance I worked with Architecture Students for Climate Action to initiate and deliver a new set of awards presented at the Schools end of year exhibition. In 2023 an award was presented to a student in each year in recognition for the quality of the work in response to the climate emergency. In 2024 I supported the initiation of 2 new awards recognising excellence in climate writing. Student Awards, Climate Emergency, Building Performance, Material Cultures, John Sampson and Catherine Skelcher

Student resource

MArch Internal Exhibition, 2021 - 2024

Alongside Cith Skelcher I developed an internal exhibition to share, celebrate and disseminate the MArch Studio Projects within the cohort. The resource replicates the physical internal exhibition that used to take place within the Arts Tower prior to the switch to digital assessment. For students the resource provides the opportunity to reflect on their own work within the context of their peers. For staff the resources helps to support their teaching practice by providing an archive of student work which they can draw upon within their own teaching.2024 Internal Exhibition2023 Internal Exhibition2022 Internal Exhibition2021 Internal ExhibitionExhibition, Digital Learning, Pedagogy, John Sampson and Catherine Skelcher

211213 The SSoA Voices Survey: A means to support knowledge-based progressive policy making to drive forward positive change at the Sheffield School of Architecture

Inclusion at SSoA

The SSoA Voices Survey, November 2021

The Sheffield School of Architecture has a positive and proactive culture which may obscure the fact that abuse and exclusion do occur.In the summer of 2020, a group of students from across the Sheffield School of Architecture (SSoA) advocated for change through proactive anti-racist activity. As a product of their conversations, they wrote "Anti-Racism at SSoA: A Call to Action", This open letter argued that ‘our school has been and remains complicit in the structures that perpetuate systemic racism within architecture’ and demanded ‘immediate action and concrete change’.The letter, and in particular its powerful testimonials, made for hard reading, asking some serious questions of the school’s claim to be a ‘Social School of Architecture’. Despite actively fostering a pedagogy and culture around ‘gender equality and feminism’, conversations on race had been either minimised or excluded altogether from the discourse.The letter had a powerful impact, with many students and staff adding their signatures, and the momentum generated has stimulated a strong desire and mandate for change within the school. We have seen in response the rejuvenation of the Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion committee of which the pro-active Student Action Group is an essential component. For those of us involved in EDI at SSoA, the ‘Call to Action' had revealed the provocative power of testimonials for progressive change. In particular, it prompted the realisation that individual narratives and the lived experience of members of our school’s community can lead to and inform action.‘A Call to Action’ declared both the necessity and the urgency of change, impressing upon us that the school must keep these conversations alive and relevant, to continue to tackle racism and other aspects of inclusion as they impact on the whole of the school community and that this needs to happen together with our agendas to decolonise the curriculum, to promote gender-equality and to tackle climate change. As a necessary action in response to ‘A Call to Action’, the Voices Survey was initiated.Report, EDI, Pedagogy, History and Theory, Participation, Jennifer Kerr and Catherine Skelcher

Feminist pedagogy

SSoA Feminist Library, May 2020 - Present

In March 2020 SSoA staff and students organised a Feminist Teach Out to explore feminist foundations, fields and futures and celebrate 20 years of feminist activity at SSoA. Many participants at the event expressed interest in having access to the work produced in the school over the years under this banner.During the last decades, numerous students have produced design and theoretical projects addressing feminist topics and methodologies which remained invisible to the wider School community. Much of the feminist work in the School took more intangible forms such as conferences, events and discussions which remained fully or partially unrecorded.The Feminist Library at SSoA will include an archive, in which previous outputs (dissertations, publications, theses, design projects, event recordings and testimonials) will be documented and stored, and a live part in which new events, activities, and debates will be posted in real time. The Feminist Library will be launched during a special event in November and disseminated across UK and international HE institutions. This will be a key resource for students and staff and will ensure that SSoA continues to set the agenda in feminist pedagogy and research.Website, EDI, History and Representation, Pedagogy, Participation, Critical pedagogy, Carolyn Butterworth and Catherine Skelcher

Feminist pedagogy

Feminist School of Architecture Teachout, 5th March 2020

20 years ago SSoA staged a 'Feminist School of Architecture take over', where organisers and collaborators took over the tower for a day, running a series of events exploring gender, politics, power and space. This year's strike provided the opportunity for teaching staff and students alike to come together this time out in the city to restage this event 20 years on and to explore what a 'Feminist School of Architecture' might mean. The tone of the event was both critical and celebratory, with a range of discussions on topics from intersectionality and housing through to feminist pedagogy and more interactive/performative pieces including testimonials and a feminist activity mapping exercise. The event captured a growing resurgence of feminist activity within the school and has planted ideas for further events and initiatives, such as the SSoA Feminist Library.'We have been teaching online for a week now and I had the chance to talk to some of the students who were at the teach-out. During the tutorials they express with enthusiasm how the event was a transformative experience for them and explain how this influenced their manifestos and positioning. These are brief but powerful moments that show how the Feminist School of Architecture have created alternative routes of thinking for students.I wanted to share with you the invisible consequences of our collective experience that I think is as powerful as the invisible virus intruding in our collective bodies'Emre AkbilEvent, EDI, Pedagogy, Placemaking, Critical pedagogy, Catherine Skelcher

"During the tutorials they express with enthusiasm how the event was a transformative experience for them."

Emre Akbil

RIBA and ABS Wellbeing research

Mental Health Forum, October 2018

Forum discussing mental health and well being at SSoA. Feedback made as part of ongoing research for RIBA and ABS."Thank you so much for participating on the panel at the Sheffield event last Wednesday evening. I understand we’ve had some excellent feedback already. People found it really informative and interesting and there was good engagement from those that attended. We are pulling a student well-being forum together to address the issues addressed at last week’s event and continue to support the work the RIBA and ABS will be doing next year around student mental health."Anne Cosentino, RIBA Equality, Diversity and Inclusion ManagerEvent, Digital learning, Pedagogy, Participation, Satwinder Samra and Catherine Skelcher

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