Review of SPAV

The college offers a good mix of diverse of inter disciplinary subjects ranging from design subjects to mathematics and structural mechanics. These subjects prepare students for professional practice and provides good exposure to various interests in the field. It aims to stimulate sensitivity to spaces, develops creative talents and reinforces intellectual capabilities. The courses varies from history, humanities, technology and professional skillsets. The negative is that most of the softwares that are required are not taught by the faculty and need to be self learnt with the help of seniors. There are two exams that take place every semester; the mid semester exams and the end semester exams. The difficulty level is medium to pass these exams. More of the focus goes onto the internals which are based on the assignments given and the quality of your work. Overall the subjects taught are very comprehensive.

The college offers internships with various architectural firms all over India and a few in abroad as well. The firms for the internships are usually selected by the students themsleves with the help of recommendations from the faculty and seniors.

The students are eligible for placements after they finish their 5th year or during the 10th semester. Students have to go on internships for one semester mandatorily in their fourth year which is the 7th semester for which they get stipend of around 10-15k for a duration of 6 months. The average package offered by the placements is somewhere around 3-4 lakhs per annum but then again is depends on the work of the student and their potential.

The school of planning and architecture offers various UG, PG and PhD programmes related to the archiecture and planning field. The tuition fee for general category for UG B.Arch course of 5 years is 95,000 per annum. The school also has hostel and mess facilities for which you should pay 30,000 and 38,880 respectively, The school also offers various financial aid programmes and scholarships for people belonging to SC and ST categories. People who belong to these categories pay 47,500 per annum (if you opt for scholarships you dont need to pay this as well). The fee structure varies between the UG, PG and PhD courses and the highest being PhD courses which is 1,10,000 per annum for only tuiton. The college also offers various student exchange programmes to countries like France based off merit.

The college has a very vibrant campus life with multiple festivals and events that takes place on a regular basis. The college conducts the college fest called Inyan that takes place every year. Festivals like Diwali. Sankranthi etc are celebrated in full swing with culturals that take place. Regular seminars also are held with various guests that come. The library also has a huge collection of books that are in correlation to the course. The college also has a good computer lab with high speed internet and accesible softwares. They also have labs like GIS lab, a printing lab and Material Lab. They also have a football ground, cricket ground, volleyball court and basketball courts. There are multiple clubs as well like tech club, fashion club, music, dance etc for which frequent workshops are held.

The hostels are very good with spacious room and clean rooms. They do not offer air conditioning in hostels so it can get quite hot in the summer. The girls and boys hostel are seperate blocks each consisting of 4 floors. Elevators are also being constructed at the moment. The hostel fee is around 30,000 per year. The washrooms are clean as well. Afforadable laundry services are offered to students as well. The mess food is decent but at times its bad. There is a canteen as well which offers fast food and is affordable and tasty.

The exams that you have to write to study the B.Arch course is NATA and JEE Paper 2 [B.Arch]. NATA exam is mainly for private colleges and not national level government colleges whereas JEE is for all the central government college. I've applied to various other colleges like SPA Delhi, SPA Bhopal, NIT Nagpur etc, but I chose SPA Vijayawada because of the comprehensive curriculum and the infrastructure and the proximity of the college as it is located in the heart of the city unlike other colleges. The hostels facilities are good and it is inside the campus and only 5 minutes from the studios. To get into SPA Vijayawada you must qualify the JEE B.Arch course and get a good rank. It is highly competetive to get into this college and you need a minimum of above 90% in JEE to get in.

The school has very qualified faculty who know what they are doing. Most of them have prior experience as practicing architects and have PhD's. The faculty to student ratio is decent. A minimum of two faculties are present for a class of 95 students. The faculty are quite knowledgable and very approachable. They will help you get good internships and guide you through college. Every semester we have around 5 subjects that are taught. The mid semester and end semester exams are not that hard but you need to have the minimum internals and attendance requirements to be eligible to write the end semester exams. The college also has study trips every semester which offers you real life examples and quality experiences.