Building Maintenance, Refurbishment & Design Building schools for the future
structures: “On top of everything else, is the disruption worth it? Do we end up with better buildings?… will it allow the staff to deliver a good quality education?”
Standardisation O
n 16th January 2013, a selection of MP’s, architects and head teacher’s gathered close to Parliament to participate in a Westminster Education Forum discussing ‘The future of school buildings - new designs, improving teaching space and utilising new technologies’. Catherine Dowling, went along to find out what the landscape of tomorrow’s school buildings sector looks like.
Budget limitations
Forum speakers also discussed the limitations of school building budgets. Darren Talbot, Schools Lead, Europe, AECOM, said schools must understand the assets they currently have and decide whether or not it’s in their best interests to demolish and rebuild or to improve existing
Talbot proposed the idea of standardised elements as a possible solution, an idea he has used whilst delivering a programme of 67 schools in West Africa: “We are not talking about standardised design, we are just looking at standardised elements. Does every school need a different toilet layout, a different kitchen layout? Could there be 3 or 4 or 5 different models that could be replicated?” The concept of flexible design was also given consideration. Simon Allford, Director, Allford Hall Monaghan Morris, said: “School design needs to be resilient and robust. One thing’s for sure… whatever we do it’ll be a different building down the line being used by someone else within two or three years. Flexibility in design and occupation is important, even when we’re designing a building the client could change two or three times.”
Looking to the future
Bob Harrison, Education Adviser at Toshiba Information Systems (UK), said in order to learn from the mistakes made during The Building
Schools For the Future (BSF) programme, we should start by asking the question: ‘what is learning going to look like?’ Then we can ask ‘what buildings do we need’?
Getting to the heart of the day’s discussion, Harrison spoke of his own grandchildren who will be leaving school in the next 10 to 15 years: “They will be leaving schools that have virtually no pens… no paper, no books, (unless they are eBooks) no projectors…no ICT suites, no classrooms full of desks and chairs,… no handwritten exams. (Schools) will be full of screens, voice recognition…gesture recognition control, learning analytics, online touch screens, online touch based assessment, instant feedback, 3D screens, tablet and wearable devices… virtual reality and augmented reality to support learning wherever and when it takes place. Learning will be context, not content driven, with co-construction, creativity, communication and collaboration valued by employers and higher education, more than (sorry Mr Gove), content regurgitation.” With the future of learning so apparently certain, future school buildings will need to foster a learning environment that nurtures and supports the relationships between users, in particular supporting those relationships between pupils, teachers and the local community.
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