28 November 2008
Students, parents, teachers. The government’s Building Schools for the Future programme is “listening and learning” from all three groups about what they want their new school to be like.
That was the main, very positive message, delivered by speakers at the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) conference to around 240 delegates in London this week.
Fortunately, too, the programme that will eventually see around 3,000 new schools built in the UK, has so far been “somewhat shielded” from the financial crisis. This is because up to 60 per cent of funding can be put up by the government, noted Tim Byles in his opening address.
But Byles, who is chief executive of Partnerships for Schools, the non-departmental public body set up by government to deliver the BSF programme, said that doesn’t guarantee against delivery delays in the future.
So on with the BSF show that has seen 42 schools now completed within the past three years. The keynote panel discussion in the morning agreed that the programme is an opportunity for schools to not just get what building they wanted, but to use that building as the basis for a new way of teaching, as noted by Mike Foster, transformation project director for Sunderland city council.
And teachers and councillors must hold onto those new ideas during the early design process because architects can have a tendency to “take over” the process.
However, Richard Simmons, chief executive of the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (Cabe), the government design advisor, thought there remains room for more innovation in school designs. This particularly applied to school properties, an almost forgotten aspect of BSF. In some schools, commented Simmons, outside development has meant larger staff parking lots.
What BSF does insist is that all schools meet Breeam ‘very good’ standards and that they are 60 per cent ‘carbon-neutral’, said Mairi Johnson, director of design for Partnerships for Schools.
Keith Papa, who as an architect with architectural firm BDP has designed BSF schools and city academies, pointed out that there is still an issue with BSF about capital costs versus running costs, even though BSF talks up a good case for this whole life costing.
Throughout the BSF process, don’t forget the kids, warned Sir John Sorrell, founder of the Sorrell Foundation that works with young people to help them attain life and work skills. In the end, he said, the students, not parents or teachers, are the real consumers of education. By include them in the design process, he said they gain a personal identity and also an ownership of their new school.
Following the work he has done with them on BSF projects in the past several years, some now have an interest in becoming architects and designers. Sorrell wants it to be mandatory that there be a student design team on every BSF project and that it should be consulted from the very start.
A new school building can be akin to science lab with regards climate change and greenhouse gas issues, explained Judit Kimpian, head of sustainability at commercial architects Aedas. All buildings, including schools, must be carbon neutral by 2019 and so monitoring their school would be of interest to students. Importantly, she said, schools must invest in good maintenance and operations people to ensure the building runs efficiently.
Simon Phillips, a director at Land Securities Trillium, agreed with Kimpian. Having good FMs in place to ensure students and teachers use the building properly remains an issue for many new-build schools.
John Matthews, principal of Brislington Enterprise College, near Bristol, advised of the importance of having well defined leadership within the school to ensure the educational vision is articulated to the architects. Initially when his colleagues were asked what they would like, the response was more shelving and an office for themselves.
Students, said Matthews, were very keen on improving the building. Their thoughts ranged from better toilets – most used the toilets in the local McDonald’s rather then the school lavatories – and a larger canteen to more social space and better outside playing fields and areas.
It may be that only 42 schools have been built, but a lot can be learned from those efforts to make even better schools in the future. In the last session of the day, Johnson, from Partnerships for Schools, acknowledged this. But she also said that no formal post-occupancy process has been set up is yet. They are looking to do so and would welcome thoughts from anyone on what they would like to see done along these lines.
But some feedback already exists, said Jane Briginshaw, an architect and now head of design for the Department for Children, Schools and Families. The design quality indicator process gets thoughts on design at four stages from all stakeholders, including students, teachers, local authorities, architects. The first is at the beginning of the design process and the fourth is a year after occupancy. This data rests with the Construction Industry Council but has not been formally collated and released, as far as she is aware.
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