Project 3: A Sustainable School

Design plans and sections

General classrooms

Science and Food Technology plans

3D images

Findings about school designs

I found some interesting information about designing for schools, done by the American Architecture Foundation at the Design for Learning Forum.
Here are their ten findings:

+ Reinvent the design process to allow for greater innovation.
+ Design with flexibility in mind: give teachers and students the freedom and space for greater creativity in the learning process.
+ Respond more quickly to the ongoing paradigm change in teaching and learning.
+ Create stronger links to education reformers seeking to close the achievement gap and design with 21st century skills in mind.
+ Recognize the power of technology as well as its limits.
+ Make the design process more inclusive: recognize the voice of students and the role of citizen designers.
+ Design for the Age Wave: recognize that in this era of life-long learning, millions of retiring baby-boomers will want to use schools facilities.
+ Rebuild the connection between school and community: design the next generation of schools as community learning centers.
+ Provide school board members with a greater level of expertise and create a richer design matrix that moves school boards beyond the bottom line as the over-riding reason to choose one design over another.
+ Invest in research that links school design to student achievement including such indirect links as teacher retention, personalization, and conditions for learning.

Materials and sustainable concepts

Part of my design was to include timber slats on the outside of the buildings to shade the classrooms. The slats are to be made of recycled timber sourced from Timber Zoo (http://www.timberzoo.com.au), located on Portarlington rd, with a native climber growing on it for further shade. I chose to use the Billardiera Scandens (or common apple berry) climber, as it can grow in shade or full sun and grows in Victoria, and is especially suited to costal conditions. More information about this plant can be found at the Sustainable Gardening Australia web site below:
http://www.sgaonline.org.au/plant_billardierascandens.html














My design uses Bamboo flooring in some of the classrooms, as an environmentally sustainable alternative to timber flooring.
http://www.bamboodirect.com.au/flooring.html
In my design I also considered thermal mass, so I chose to use CSR Hebel, or autoclaved, aerated concrete (AAC), in my walls. The image below demonstrated how the Hebel attaches to the frame. It is also a lightweight and quick design alternative to traditional concrete.
www.hebelaustralia.com.au

Sustainable School

In my research on sustainable schools, I came across the Sidwell Friends School, which has a sustainable designed Middle School Green Building. The building includes ‘recycled, rapidly renewable, and locally produced materials, as well as paints, carpets and adhesives with low emission of volatile organic compounds, and even the most of the wood comes from environmentally certified sources.’ Furthermore, it has a constructed wetland for treating waste, solar panels for electricity generation, and uses passive solar design such as ventilation and shading systems.

http://www.sidwell.edu/about_sfs/greenbuilding_ms.asp

Visit the web site to take a tour of the school and see all its environmental features:
http://www.sidwell.edu/green_tour/