← Back to Timeline
Progress Reflection
& Check-in
Week 11 — Take a step back. Assess where you are, reflect on the process so far, and calibrate for the final push toward your proposal and presentation.
01. Where We Are
You are entering Week 11 of 13 — the tail end of the Design Phase.
By now your team has traversed from open-ended discovery through programming, concept generation,
and into detailed design. This is a natural inflection point to pause and take stock.
Week 1 · Jan 14
Week 11 of 13 — 84.6% through the semester
Week 13 · Apr 8
02. The Road So Far
A compact look at the ground you've covered. Click any phase to expand the detail.
Discovery Phase — Weeks 1–3
▼
Wk 1
Project Launch & Team Formation — roles defined, research centers surveyed
Wk 2
Stakeholder Analysis & Site Research — personas created, pain points mapped
Wk 3
Neuroscience Principles & Precedent Studies — evidence-based design foundations laid
Programming Phase — Weeks 4–6
▼
Wk 4
Space Requirements — functional needs cataloged, adjacency diagrams started
Wk 5
Program of Requirements — square footage allocated, environmental standards set
Wk 6
Preliminary Concepts — first design ideas generated, stakeholder check-in
Concept Phase — Weeks 7–9
▼
Wk 7
Concept Development — divergent thinking, multiple design directions explored
Wk 8
Concept Evaluation — decision matrices, scoring, stakeholder feedback
Wk 9
Hybrid Development — best elements combined, mid-project review ★
Design Phase — Weeks 10–11
▼
Wk 10
Detailed Design — floor plans finalized, 3D visualizations, signature spaces
Wk 11
Budget & Implementation — cost estimates, timeline, risk strategies
Now
Delivery Phase — Weeks 12–13
▼
Wk 12
Proposal Document — compile, peer review, refine
Ahead
Wk 13
Final Presentations — present to panel, revisions, celebration ★
Ahead
03. Skills & Competencies Developed
Over the past 10 weeks, you've been building a toolkit that bridges neuroscience, engineering, and design. Take a moment to appreciate the breadth of what you've practiced.
Stakeholder Analysis
Personas, interviews, needs mapping
Evidence-Based Design
Literature review, neuroscience principles
Space Programming
POR, adjacency, SF allocation
Concept Generation
Divergent thinking, ideation
Decision Making
Trade-off matrices, evaluation
Visualization
Floor plans, 3D models, renderings
Team Collaboration
Roles, communication, integration
Budget & Planning
Cost estimation, risk analysis — in progress
04. Guided Reflection
Use these prompts individually or in your team meeting. Honest reflection drives growth. Write your answers down — you'll reference them in your final proposal narrative.
-
Process
What was the most difficult transition between phases? When did the project feel "messy" — and how did your team push through it?
-
Process
Look at your original team roles from Week 1. Have they shifted? Did someone emerge in a role you didn't expect?
-
Learning
What neuroscience principle surprised you the most? How did it change a design decision your team made?
-
Learning
What do you understand about the built environment now that you didn't at the start? Could you explain it to a friend in another discipline?
-
Design
If you could go back to Week 7 (concept generation), what would you do differently? Would you explore a direction your team discarded?
-
Design
Which "signature space" in your design are you most proud of? What makes it special from a neuroscience-informed perspective?
-
Impact
Has working on this project changed how you experience buildings and spaces in your daily life? Give an example.
-
Growth
What skill or competency listed above feels strongest? Which one do you want to develop further before the semester ends?
05. Team Health Check
A quick diagnostic. Discuss these openly with your team — flag areas that need attention before the final sprint.
🟢 What's Working
Identify strengths your team should lean into:
- Communication cadence and quality
- Division of labor that plays to strengths
- Integration across disciplinary perspectives
- Managing feedback from stakeholders
🟡 Watch Zones
Areas that need attention but aren't critical yet:
- Scope creep vs. realistic constraints
- Depth vs. breadth in the final proposal
- Uneven workload distribution
- Time management for remaining deliverables
🔴 Action Required
Non-negotiables for the next two weeks:
- Budget estimates cannot be vague — get specific
- Implementation timeline must be realistic
- Every design decision needs a "why"
- Proposal document structure must be agreed on
06. The Final Sprint — Weeks 12 & 13
You have two weeks to transform your work into a polished, professional deliverable. Here's what needs to happen:
-
📋
Week 12: Proposal Document — Compile everything into a cohesive proposal: executive summary, design vision, space program, floor plans, budget, timeline. Peer review within the team.
-
🎤
Week 13: Final Presentation — 15–20 minute presentation to a review panel. Every team member should speak. Tell the story of your design — the research, the reasoning, the neuroscience.
-
⚡
Priority this week: Lock down your budget framework and implementation timeline. These are the "reality check" components that ground your creative vision.
-
🧠
Don't forget the neuroscience: Your final proposal should clearly trace design decisions back to evidence-based principles. This is what sets your work apart from a generic architecture project.
💡 Tip
Start your proposal document now, even if it's rough. The biggest risk in Week 12 is discovering you haven't agreed on your narrative structure. A shared outline this week saves hours of chaos next week.
07. The Bigger Picture
This course asked you to do something unusual: design a building using the brain as your guide. Whether you go on to be a researcher, an engineer, a clinician, or a designer, the core insight persists:
Think About It
Every environment you encounter — a hospital, a classroom, a lab, a home — is shaping the cognition, mood, and productivity of the people inside it. You now have a framework for understanding how and why. That lens doesn't go away after Week 13.
The skills you've developed — translating between disciplines, thinking in systems, balancing evidence with creativity, making design decisions under uncertainty — these are transferable far beyond this project.