In our article we want to indicate how conceiving of the university as a ‘learning environment’ tends to reduce its operation and value as an ‘educational sphere’.  Applying the conceptual schema of the learning environment to the university implies indeed that the relation the university maintains with the society remains largely unthought or is framed only in terms of access, finance, or societal impact. The space of the university would be reduced to a spatial structuration and arrangement of or for (individual or group) learning. We want to investigate how different architectural-educational configurations of universities materialize the relation between the university and society, and hence offer a variety of understandings of the educational significance of the universities. We will explore this topic through a spatial analysis of three case studies which offer concrete examples of modalities of mediation between university and society: the African Virtual University in Nairobi (Kenya), the Rolex Learning Center in Lausanne (Switzerland) and Campus in Camps in Bethlehem (Palestine). In a first step, we will present the infratheoretical understanding of each design. In a second step, we will sketch out a preliminary theoretical framework that allows us to come to a typology of architectural and educational forms. In the end we will come to an educational understanding of the relation between university and society, more specifically from the perspective of potentiality.

Adorno, T. W. (1967). Funktionalismus heute. In G. Busch (Ed.), Ohne Leitbild. Parva Aesthetica (pp. 104–127). Frankfurt am Main: Edition Suhrkamp. Agamben, G. (1995). We refugees. Symposium, 49(2), 114–119. Agamben, G. (2011). Homo sacer. De soevereine macht en het naakte leven. (I. van der Burg, Trans.) (2nd ed.). Amsterdam: Boom. Della Casa, F., & Maltz, E. (2010). Rolex Learning Center. Lausanne: Presses Polytechniques et Universitaires Romandes. Diallo, B. (2010). Charter of the African Virtual University or the AVU. Nairobi, Kenya. Retrieved from http://www.avu.org/About-AVU/avu-charter.html Heynen, H. (1992). Architecture between modernity and dwelling: Reflections on Adorno’s “Aesthetic Theory.” Assemblage, 17, 78–91. Heynen, H. (1999). Architecture and modernity. A critique. Cambridge (MA): The MIT Press. Kruschwitz, C. (2011). Universität und Stadt. Bauliche Genese von Universitätstypen und deren Bedeutung im Stadtraum (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Rheinisch-Westfälischen Technischen Hochschule Aachen, Aachen. Loos, A. (2010). Architektur. 1910. In A. Opel (Ed.), Adolf Loos. Gesammelte Schriften. (pp. 391–404). Vienna: Braumüller Verlag. Petti, A. (2013a). Campus in camps. A university in exile. Retrieved from https://issuu.com/campusincamps/docs/the_cic_book-pages Petti, A. (2013b). Spatial ordering of exile. The architecture of Palistinian refugee camps. Crios: Critica Degli Ordinamenti Spaziali, (1), 62–70.