NEW LOWER SCHOOL W
onder, curiosity, and imagination are the special ingredients that fuel the OES Beginning and Lower Schools. Tis magical combination is evident
everywhere—literally, everywhere. Te teachers have filled every nook and cranny with creativity and expression. Te science program is wheeled around on beige plastic carts and trays from classroom to classroom, hallways are sprouting all manner of mixed media artwork in a wonderfully creative pop-up
art studio, and the early years Spanish program is based at an unassuming desk in the corner of the technology office. Specialists, technology coordinators, and small groups scurry about this anthill of activity inspiring their students with new experiences and materials. Welcome to the soon-to-be-former OES Lower School.
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A CHANGING CAMPUS For more than 50 years, the Beginning and Lower Schools have occupied buildings that had to be dreamed up, planned, and built in less than two years when city officials ordered the students, faculty, and staff to say farewell to the stately Victorian schoolhouse in downtown Portland to make way for the I-405 interchange. Eminent domain made it necessary for the relocation of the school. At the time the buildings were built in the early 1960s, teaching and learning styles were very different: teacher at the blackboard… rows of desks facing the front…students learn. Te dynamic and engaging education that would soon develop from Saint Helen’s Hall would welcome a brother school, Bishop Dagwell Hall, at the new site on Nicol Road. By the early 1970s the schools would merge and become Oregon Episcopal School. OES is always morphing, like a caterpillar on the shoot of a cattail in our nearby wetlands. Te crystallization of programs and teaching has filled our cocoon, and now it’s bursting open to reveal a gorgeous new being: a fantastic, colorful, and majestic butterfly. OES has outgrown our 50-year-old cocoon, and now we are embarking on building a new combined Lower School.
We asked our faculty to think about how we teach today, five years from now, and 20 years from now. Their big ideas defined our vision for the new Lower School. — David Lowell, head of Lower School
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DESIGN FEATURES Visitors to OES are greeted by geese swimming
in the wetlands, trees towering above the sidewalks, and rhododendrons and flowers bursting with their colorful blooms. Soon this welcoming gateway will also include the new Lower School building. Te vision for how to have it enhance the entrance was made a priority by the architects. “We really wanted to highlight the openness of the building and the campus,” said David Keltner, principal at THA Architecture. “We wanted to show visitors what OES is all about. Te natural environment is a unique treasure of the school and it had to be at the front of the design.” Te students and their teachers were involved with
every stage of the planning and designing of the building. Te faculty was led in design thinking exercises by Cadwell Collaborative to create a building that reflects the pedagogy of OES. Tese guided discussions were a bridge to the collaborative design work with the lead architects where students presented their drawings and 3D models as they pitched their concepts for what they wanted to see in their new learning environment. Te building footprint will feature dedicated outdoor space with access for teachers to move lesson plans
Opposite page: Lower School students present models and pitch their ideas for the new Lower School building with OES Director of Facilities Jon von Behren (top) and THA Architecture Principal David Keltner (bottom).
LEARN MORE:
www.oes.edu/ campaign
• Video and more Summer 2015 7
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