School buildings

Developing technology and architectural design techniques have affected the field of architecture to a great extent. As a result, human comfort has become increasingly important in recent years. A natural ventilation cooling strategy which serves as the alternative to the airconditioning system has been effectively employed in high-rise office buildings in western countries. This paper discusses the possibility of using natural ventilation strategy in school buildings. It evaluates some of the key issues associated with natural ventilation design and school buildings, including its the types, its working principles and limitations of passive ventilation, its effects and forms of natural ventilation when used in libraries, offices, auditoriums and dormitory buildings. This work also evaluates and how does the effects of architectural design on the passive ventilation such as orientation, depth of room, the atrium and solar chimney. Based on case studies on Queens building at De Montfort University, Liberty tower of Meiji University and simulation regarding ecological dormitory building in China. These three buildings have been selected to operate as simultaneously in different climatic and thermal comfort conditions. It is concluded that single-side ventilation and cross-ventilation can have good effect on cooling and improving air quality in school buildings with different functions as long as the height and depth of rooms are properly designed. Solar wall and solar chimney can also be employed to enhance natural ventilation performance based on the principle of stack effect.

The paper presents architectural plans of selected school buildings, designed during the interwar period in Lublin. Their architectural style is characterized by changes typical for tendencies present in Polish architecture at the moment: from traditionalism, popular in the 1st half of the 1920s, through gradual simplification of the detail and the shape of the building in the 2nd half of the 1920s, up to mature modernism of the 2nd half of the 1930s.

This article investigates how school building design can support primary school feeding programmes in low- and middle-income countries. Furthermore it argues for schools to become community “development hubs”; incorporating both local access to education and also to programmes for nutrition, ICT, health education and other services, outside of school hours. It reviews the literature on school feeding programmes. Data from field research on schools in Ghana and South Africa is used to identify the key design issues for schools delivering feeding programmes. It considers how national education policies can affect school planning and building priorities. The article concludes by calling for the evolution of a new school design model, in which the school site becomes a “development hub”, supporting children” education, associated support activities including school feeding, and importantly also, integrated community development outreach activities.

The main goal of this paper is to present a set of well-defined and structured procedures to establish guidelines for the application of an integrated assessment of energy performance and indoor climate in schools. Increasing the knowledge about how energy is consumed in schools is a way to enhance the awareness of school managers (board of directors) about the importance of improving energy efficiency and reducing energy costs. The proposed methodology helps to identify major energy consuming equipment in school buildings and potential energy conservation measures. The assessment of indoor climate identifies potential corrective measures to problems related to indoor air quality and thermal comfort, also supporting the study of further energy conservation measures associated with ensuring environmental quality. Results of a case study showed that the expected energy consumption reduction is about 11.2% due to a better usage of daylighting and 4.5% due to the reduction of fresh air flow rates, while extending the ventilation operation time. In addition, there is a considerable non-calculated potential for energy savings and improvement of indoor environmental conditions in school buildings, promoting students and teachers productivity and wellbeing.

"Todos os dias, nos meus primeiros meses de escola, saía da palhota do meu pai
com o meu irmão, descia a ladeira com os músculos das pernas retesados para
não cair. Foi assim apenas por alguns dias porque, com a prática, passámos a
descer a correr, sem nos importarmos com a cacimba que nos molhava.
Passávamos ao longo do arenoso caminho dos bois, atravessávamos, em
seguida, o pântano onde o nevoeiro era mais denso. Tínhamos de tirar as
sapatilhas para não as molharmos nos charcos que as chuvas deixavam, e
não as sujarmos com o matope que ficava no carreiro que tínhamos de seguir
dentre os mavungu e o caniço do pântano, tínhamos de saltar de um mcoma,
raíz de mavungu, para outro quando isto nos podia salvar de mergulhar
numa poça mais profunda de água ou de lama preta.
Nos dias mais frios, os dentes batiam com vibração e cadência rápidas
dos maxilares. Era normal. Não ligávamos a mínima importância. Não
sabíamos que não estávamos agasalhados o suficiente. Nunca o tínhamos
estado. O que sabíamos é que fazia frio e muita cacimba, caminhávamos,
depois, pela estrada principal, alteada de saibro no meio da planície ligando
o ‘Ntavene’ à cidade baixa. A maior parte das vezes, quando não passava
o comboio, preferíamos andar ao longo da linha férrea. Estaríamos mais
protegidos do perigo de sermos atropelados pelos carros ou de sermos molhados
com água vermelha de saibro, caso um carro, em velocidade, entrasse num
charco e a espalhasse pelos lados. Quando chegávamos à escola, ou um pouco
antes, encontrávamos já lá os nossos colegas brancos que não tiritavam de frio
porque levavam camisolas bem quentes que até lhes cobriam os pescoços. Nós
também, nessa altura, não sentíamos tanto frio. Tínhamos andado tanto que
o esforço de marchar e de correr nos aquecia" (Chissano, 2011: 81-82).

La apertura internacional que experimentó España en los años 50 propició un cambio en la política educativa. En este momento, se tomó conciencia de la importancia de la educación para el desarrollo del país y se estableció como objetivo urgente cubrir el déficit de puestos escolares. En 1956 se emprendió un ambicioso programa de construcción de escuelas que se prolongó, en sucesivas etapas, hasta 1972. Este proyecto no sólo se encargó de la creación de nuevos centros, también fomentó la mejora de su calidad. El conocimiento de los ejemplos de la vanguardia internacional junto al estudio de las circunstancias españolas permitió crear un discurso propio que se hizo patente tanto en el ámbito teórico como en las obras construidas. En este proceso, los arquitectos españoles definieron nuevas soluciones sin precedentes que alcanzaron una posición destacada en el contexto internacional.
Asimismo, la escuela se consideró un lugar para formar, además de para instruir, y las necesidades físicas, afectivas y sociales de los alumnos se convirtieron en parámetros de diseño. En este nuevo escenario, se agudizó la necesidad de recurrir a una arquitectura esencial, capaz de aunar innovación e identidad. Las escuelas dejaron de entenderse como agregados de aulas independientes y surgieron nuevas vinculaciones a través de espacios compartidos. Las áreas de relación se convirtieron en elementos focales alrededor de las cuales se desarrollaría la actividad de la escuela. Asimismo, se consiguió una escala doméstica, mediante el estudio minucioso de la relación entre las partes del programa. En definitiva, los arquitectos españoles aportaron modelos escolares de gran permeabilidad y flexibilidad, con una gran capacidad didáctica y especial énfasis social.

Among all public buildings, on account of their educational purpose, school buildings have a major social responsibility. Therefore energy performance in this type of building is of great importance. The overall purpose of this research is to achieve a functional benchmarking, based on the real operation conditions of school buildings, by the exploitation of the results made public, through an intensive literature survey on energy consumptions in schools. The survey was made to gather data that is relative to energy consumption in school buildings, documented in the most diverse fields and units: global energy consumption values, electrical energy consumption; fuel consumption for heating, energy data consumption of schools expressed in annual cost per unit of heated/cooled surface area ($/m 2) or per unit of heated/cooled volume ($/m 3) or, finally, as the annual cost per student ($/student). The literature was analyzed to determine if a worldwide comparison among the published data could be established. The results suggest that when attempting to determine an energy benchmark some considerations should not be forgotten: standard indoor environmental conditions (IEC) for classrooms (set-point for indoor operative temperature of 20 1C in winter and 26 1C in summer as suggested in EN 15251:2007), electrical and heating consumption values should be kept separately, different education levels usually require different energy consumption values. A good way to normalize heating energy consumption is going through a climatic adjustment based on Heating Degree Days (HDD). For an impartial data comparison, based either on an operating rating or on a simulation carried out for reference conditions, benchmark reference values should be expressed in terms of billed energy data.

Nel corso del 2020 l’emergenza sanitaria ha messo alla prova gli spazi degli edifici scolastici in Italia, evidenziando i limiti di un patrimonio datato, che necessita di interventi urgenti. I circa 40.000 edifici che costituiscono l’infrastruttura scolastica del nostro Paese sono un’eredità stratificata e capillarmente diffusa sul territorio nazionale, che richiede un ripensamento anche alla luce dei cambiamenti sociali, demografici e pedagogici degli ultimi decenni. Il progetto di ricerca avviato dal Future Urban Legacy Lab (FULL) sugli spazi dell’Istituto Comprensivo “C. Alvaro - P. Gobetti” , in collaborazione con il corpo docente della scuola, si inserisce in questo contesto.
FULL ha intrapreso dalla sua fondazione una riflessione riguardo il riuso del patrimonio edilizio esistente, e in particolare degli edifici di proprietà pubblica, per fini di interesse sociale e al servizio delle comunità locali. In particolare, l’approfondimento di una riflessione sull’infrastruttura scolastica è iniziata a maggio 2020 in collaborazione con
Fondazione Agnelli, nell’ambito di una ricerca che aveva come scopo il rientro in sicurezza
degli allievi durante la seconda ondata della pandemia e che ha portato alla redazione del documento “Fare Spazio. Idee progettuali per riaprire le scuole in sicurezza”. Il percorso di ricerca sugli spazi delle scuole è ancora attivo, nella forma di consulenze alla Regione Piemonte e alla Regione Lombardia per l’elaborazione di una visione d’insieme dell’edilizia scolastica a scala regionale finalizzata alla pianificazione strategica e alla diffusione di una cultura della rigenerazione. La ricerca per l’Istituto comprensivo “C. Alvaro - P. Gobetti” si svolge sulla traccia di questi progetti, come applicazione sperimentale dei principi individuati in “Fare Spazio”.
L’obiettivo del lavoro è esplorare il potenziale di trasformazione degli spazi della scuola per supportare la comunità scolastica nella pianificazione strategica della trasformazione dello spazio dell’apprendimento e per attivare processi di rigenerazione dell’esistente.
Il riconoscimento del potenziale di trasformazione dell’edificio scolastico tra le via Romita, via Balla e via Pietro Canonica a Torino è la base per stimolare e supportare la progettualità degli insegnanti e del Dirigente Scolastico.
Le indicazioni e gli stimoli contenuti in questo documento potranno essere utili alla comunità scolastica come strumento educativo dello spazio - interno ed esterno - nello sviluppo di progetti didattici e per l’eventuale sviluppo dei progetti di rigenerazione da candidare a bandi emessi da soggetti finanziatori sia pubblici che privati.

This paper focuses on the Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) of school buildings and its impact on the health and well-being of the building's occupants (students and teachers). Determining the levels of IEQ is a rather complex and partly subjective process, which involves setting and measuring a number of environmental parameters (such as temperature, humidity, light intensity and ventilation), as well as evaluating the related perceptions of all stakeholders. The effects of IEQ on human health are significant, ranging from minor distractions and performance decrease, to major diseases and health deterioration (Bertollini et al, 2010). Unfortunately, these issues are not well-known, especially in school buildings in Greece. However, in order to have a clear and documented idea of IEQ, it is necessary to implement scientific methodologies, based on measurements and questionnaires. To determine and test the theoretical background of this paper, a selected and well-defined methodology for determining the IEQ has been applied to three school complexes within the Filothei – Psychiko Municipality in the greater area of Athens. The evaluation process consists of two parts: measurement of IEQ parameters in the classrooms and having the students, their parents and their teachers complete questionnaires regarding their perception of IEQ in the school environment, based on the EN 15251:2008 Standard. The results reveal a number of problems concerning Indoor Air Quality, Glare and Thermal Comfort, especially during the warmer months. A comparison of the results of each methodology is also made, leading to conclusions on methodological issues. Conclusions are also drown on the insufficiency of the existing regulatory framework and scientific research on IEQ, both of which need to be developed and enriched. Furthermore, it is suggested that immediate action should be taken in order to improve the indoor environment of buildings (especially those which accommodate vulnerable population groups, such as children), by training and educating their users and redesigning and reforming their management.

This study investigates how Mexican primary school architecture has developed, and how it responds to the needs of its users at the present day. Mexican educational policy and programmes for primary education have changed during the last decades; whereas school design has been at a standstill. Therefore this study examines the relationship between primary school facilities and the activities they accommodate nowadays. The research was carried out in two phases, using a qualitative approach, and combining interpretative-historical and empirical research. In the first phase, the history of Mexican educational architecture was explored in order to identify the relationship between educational trends and school design from the 1930s to the present. Findings indicate that school construction programmes from the 1930s to the early 1960s were related to the national educational agenda at least at some level, but from the late 1960s onwards there is a mismatch between school design and educational policy. The second phase involved the identification of existing international guidance in school design recently produced in the UK, USA, and by international organisations such as UNESCO and OECD. These design principles and best practices were used as a framework to evaluate the appropriateness of different types of school buildings; special attention was paid to standard prototypes currently supported by Mexican authorities. Fieldwork consisted of surveying eight case-studies in the City of Veracruz. The performance of standard and non-standard schools was compared, the latter were found to perform considerably better. The most significant finding to emerge from this research is that, in Mexico, the use of standard primary school buildings provides a number of advantages for the civil servants in charge of the school construction programmes and for building contractors, but it is clearly detrimental to the quality of learning environments. The results of the present study were used to develop practical recommendations aimed at improving current primary school prototypes which, unlike previous studies in the field, take account of users’ opinions and international best practices.

Developing technology and architectural design techniques have affected the field of architecture to a great extent. As a result, human comfort has become increasingly important in recent years. A natural ventilation cooling strategy which serves as the alternative to the airconditioning system has been effectively employed in high-rise office buildings in western countries. This paper discusses the possibility of using natural ventilation strategy in school buildings. It evaluates some of the key issues associated with natural ventilation design and school buildings, including its the types, its working principles and limitations of passive ventilation, its effects and forms of natural ventilation when used in libraries, offices, auditoriums and dormitory buildings. This work also evaluates and how does the effects of architectural design on the passive ventilation such as orientation, depth of room, the atrium and solar chimney. Based on case studies on Queens building at De Montfort University, Liberty tower of Meiji University and simulation regarding ecological dormitory building in China. These three buildings have been selected to operate as simultaneously in different climatic and thermal comfort conditions. It is concluded that single-side ventilation and cross-ventilation can have good effect on cooling and improving air quality in school buildings with different functions as long as the height and depth of rooms are properly designed. Solar wall and solar chimney can also be employed to enhance natural ventilation performance based on the principle of stack effect.

Salama, A. M. and Adams, W. G. (2003). Designing Sustainable Learning Environments: Rethinking the Missing Dimensions, AUEJ: AlAzhar University Engineering Journal, 7(Special Issue). ISSN # 1110-6406.

There is a great deal of discussions in design, architecture, and construction circles on sustainable learning environments, and widely varying opinions as to how exactly sustainability can be introduced and approached. Recent literature indicates that the term encompasses more than the physical and economic aspects. It includes social, cultural, and behavioral dimensions. However, investigating contemporary architectural practices reveals that there are two major missing dimensions. On the one hand, there is an emphasis on the physical aspects of sustainability while socio-cultural and socio-behavioral dimensions are oversimplified. On the other hand, there is a heavy reliance on top-down policies and strategies with the aim of developing guidelines to be implemented for the betterment of learning environments. Strikingly, this takes place at the expense of other bottom-up strategies that aim at sensitizing users toward understanding the key issues underlying sustainability. The argument of this paper is based on the belief that adopting the principles of sustainability is a comprehensive approach for a society to seek sound solutions. It calls for a responsive approach that incorporates these missing dimensions into current policies and strategies for designing and building sustainable learning environments. The paper explores different definitions of sustainability as viewed by the international community. It critically analyzes the problems associated with sustainability terminology, while comparing between top-down and bottom-up approaches to sustainability. In order to support the overall argument, the paper offers analyses of a number of real life cases that illustrate how socio-behavioral dimensions can be addressed in a collaborative design process and how bottom-up strategies can be integrated into this process.

En 1933, à quelques semaines d’intervalle, sont inaugurées la nouvelle École nationale d’horlogerie de Besançon et la nouvelle École nationale d’optique de Morez. Emblématiques des dynamiques industrielles locales mais aussi des politiques engagées dans l’entre-deux-guerres pour développer l’enseignement technique, elles figurent parmi les premières réalisations qui expriment de manière tangible les ambitions de ce programme.
La construction de ces deux écoles, abritant aujourd’hui le lycée Jules Haag et le lycée polyvalent Victor Bérard, associe deux architectes. Elles reflètent les convictions de Paul Guadet (1873-1931), architecte-conseil de l’Enseignement technique, en matière d’édifices publics et leur chantier est supervisé par André Boucton (1891-1977), son jeune collaborateur bisontin, qui achève les bâtiments après la mort prématurée de son aîné.
La relation que nouent ainsi les deux hommes invite ici à mettre en lumière leurs personnalités et leur productions respectives. Ce portrait « en miroir » constitue aussi la première rétrospective monographique qui leur soit consacrée.

Los años 50 y 60 suponen una época destacada de la historia de la arquitectura española y además un momento en el que, por su contexto social y político, la enseñanza primaria desempeñó un papel fundamental en el desarrollo del país. En 1956 el Estado emprendió un ambicioso programa de construcción de escuelas que se prolongó, en sucesivas etapas, hasta 1972. Este proyecto no sólo se encargó de la creación de nuevos centros, también fomentó la investigación y mejora de los espacios de enseñanza. En este momento, la escuela pasó a considerarse un lugar para formar, además de para instruir, y las necesidades físicas, afectivas y sociales de los alumnos se convirtieron en parámetros de diseño. En este período, se definieron nuevas soluciones sin precedentes, dando lugar a una transformación considerable de la tipología. El trabajo que se presenta trata la evolución del edificio escolar en el período señalado desde el acercamiento al proceso proyectual. Para ello se exponen las conclusiones extraídas del análisis de un catálogo de 140 escuelas primarias, acompañadas de información gráfica de una selección de ejemplos. Para acometer el análisis de este proceso se han diferenciado tres etapas consecutivas que, si bien se superponen y responden a un fenómeno único, su diferenciación facilita la exposición de los distintos factores que entraron en consideración en la arquitectura escolar en este singular período. La determinación de los cambios de la tipología permite identificar nuevos tipos y sostener la importante contribución de esta época al diseño de los edificios de enseñanza.

This work was developed in the context of the research project Energy Efficient Schools (Escolas Energeticamente Eficientes, 3Es). Within this project an integrated approach for energy performance and indoor environmental quality assessment in school buildings has been developed aiming at contributing to reduce the energy consumption in school buildings while providing good indoor environmental conditions to the occupants. So far, the results shown that there is a considerable potential for reducing energy consumption and improving energy usage. We believe energy efficiency in school buildings can be achieved through an effective energy management methodology greatly supported by building management systems. This paper aims at creating foundations for energy efficiency plans for school buildings centered on the fundamental role of energy management systems and its adequate parameterization. Based on a real case-study, a primary approach is "scratched" highly centered on the enhancement of operational management practices.

Past destructive earthquakes in Turkey revealed that seismic performance of existing school buildings is inadequate as evidenced by significant damage experienced by these buildings. As a result of the unexpectedly poor performance a comprehensive study has been initiated to identify seismic vulnerabilities of existing school buildings in many parts of the country. 321 reinforced concrete (RC) school buildings located in Istanbul that were assessed in detail under the World Bank program ISMEP, had been previously assessed in Maziliguney et al. (2012) following various walk-down and preliminary seismic vulnerability assessment procedures. The results are compared with the ones obtained from linear detailed analysis method of Turkish Earthquake Code (TEC), and performance of the available methodologies had been comparatively tested. Fragility analyses by means of nonlinear time history analyses have been performed utilizing equivalent single-degree-of-freedom (SDOF) systems of the typ...

Salama, A. M. (2005). PLADEW: A Tool for Teachers Awareness of School Building Sustainability: The Case of Carmel School, Matthews, North Carolina, GBER: Global Built Environment Review, 5(1), pp. 45-56. ISSN # 1474-6824.

Recent Studies on sustainability suggest a strong correlation between the physical environment of school building and students’ performance and behavior. An argument is developed to support this premise based on a structured content analysis procedure. The typical approach for addressing sustainability in learning environments is analytically discussed. This approach—through guidance documents—emphasizes top-down policies that successfully address the professional community. However, school building users are rarely addressed through bottom-up strategies. PLADEW, a tool to sensitize school teachers toward understanding the key issues underlying sustainability was developed. This is based on the assumption that “if the learning environment has an impact on students’ performance, productivity, and behavior, then teachers need to be aware of the physical elements of the school building that influence their students.” It is regarded as an awareness tool that involves a checklist and a rating system. The tool was implemented in Carmel School, Mathews, North Carolina where teachers conducted self guided tours and became familiar with sustainability, and were able to comprehend and realize what features positively impact the teaching/learning process while enhancing their students performance. A brief set of recommendations was developed to emphasize bottom up strategies in the current efforts undertaking by school districts and government agencies.

Post-panopticism is aligned with the Foucauldian conception of power and illustrates its apparatuses and mechanisms, for instance the visibility of bodies under the gaze, the facility to mobilise power relations for political purposes, and the capacity to engage self-technologies where there is self-surveillance and surveillance of others. As a concept, it is a confluence of the disciplinary power of panoptic control and the ubiquitous security mechanism of biopower in action. Post-panopticism in the discipline provides a means to identify areas of lack in teacher and student populations. Post-panoptic surveillance in Australian schools is illustrated in this article around the use of data wall displays. Data walls are a collective mechanism that produces biopower through its alignment with panoptic disciplinary power in schools. These data assemblages are an example of a suite of technologies that profile student performance, mould teaching practices, and shape subjectivities of leaders, teachers, and students.

Este artigo trata da relação entre dois movimentos de modernização em curso no Brasil na 1930: na pedagogia, o movimento Escola Nova, que pregava o ensino voltado para o processo de aprendizado do educando, através da atividade prática, em reação à educação tradicional; e na arquitetura, o Movimento Moderno, tendo como objeto empírico as edificações escolares resultantes da reforma educacional da Paraíba, de 1935. Nosso objetivo é verificar como se produziu a modernização da arquitetura escolar paraibana na década de 1930, com a adoção das ideias do movimento Escola Nova. Para isso, foi analisado o complexo educacional correspondente ao antigo Instituto de Educação da Paraíba, instituição projetada como modelo do novo sistema educacional paraibano, segundo os pressupostos da " verdadeira architectura moderna ". O projeto do Instituto de Educação da Paraíba foi examinado juntamente com o memorial de sua construção (JOFFILY, 1937), à luz das ideias da Escola Nova, principalmente as que foram divulgadas no Manifesto dos Pioneiros da Educação Nova (1932), um dos documentos mais importantes em âmbito nacional desse movimento pedagógico.

Salama, A. M. (Ed.) (2009). Shaping the Future of Learning Environments: Emerging Paradigms and Best Practices. Open House International, 34(1), 1-128.

Whether in school buildings or university campuses the educational process involves many activities that include knowledge acquisition and assimilation, testing students’ motivation and academic performance, and faculty and teachers’ productivity. The way in which we approach the planning, design, and our overall perception of learning environments makes powerful statements about how we view education; how educational buildings are designed tells us much about how teaching and learning activities occur. Concomitantly, how these activities are accommodated in a responsive educational environment is a critical issue that deserves special attention. While it was said several decades ago that a good teacher can teach anywhere, a growing body of knowledge—derived from knowledge on “evidence-based design” suggests a direct correlation between the physical aspects of the learning environment, teaching processes, and learning outcomes. In its commitment to introduce timely and pressing issues on built environment research, Open House International presents this special edition to debate and reflect on current discourses on sustainable learning environments.

As a guest editor of this edition, my personal interest, acquaintance, and experience of learning environments come primarily from working with Henry Sanoff in the early nineties on a research project—funded by the National Endowment for the Arts and conducted at the School of Architecture at North Carolina State University—addressing environments for young children, in which a number of collaborative mechanisms for understanding and anatomizing the learning environment are developed, while exploring the wide of variety of needs and interests that are mandated by different user types (Sanoff, 1994, 1995, 2002). Such an experience was enhanced by my involvement with Adams Group Architects in Charlotte, North Carolina in a research and consultancy capacity during the period between 2001 and 2004 (Salama, 2002, Salama and Adams 2003 a. and b., Salama, 2004, Salama, 2007). Several strategic planning projects, pre-design studies, and participatory programming and design were developed for schools in North Carolina.

A worldwide commitment to designing responsive environments conducive to learning is witnessed in many academic settings. This is evident in a recent colloquium conducted by Colloquia of Lausanne, Switzerland, and in the recent efforts by recent practices in both developing and developed countries (Knapp, Noschis, and Pasalar, 2007; DesignShare, 2008; NCEF, 2008). Notably, in many schools of architecture the subject is being debated through research and design where future generations of architects are exploring possibilities of shaping the future of learning environments. An important example among many others is the studio project undertaken at the Post Graduate Level at Queen’s University Belfast and coordinated by Alan M. Jones and Karim Hadjri. In this project and through designing a context-based high school in Belfast, students are developing a deeper insight into the understanding of sustainable design parameters including lighting experience and the distinctive characteristics of the spatial environment and its impact on learning.

See Editorial: Salama, A. M. (2009). A Bright Future for Creating Environments Conducive to Learning, Open House International, 34, 1, pp.5-8

Uno de los campos de la arquitectura más trabajados por César Ortiz-Echagüe ha sido el de los centros de enseñanza. En la conferencia que impartió en la Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura de la Universidad de Navarra en 1970, destacó la enorme transformación que experimentó la tipología escolar en los años 50 y 60 y la importancia del conocimiento de las orientaciones pedagógicas contemporáneas para dar las mejores respuestas arquitectónicas. Los viajes que realizó por Europa Central le permitieron profundizar en la materia y conocer referencias de gran calidad que tendrían repercusión en su propia obra. Asimismo, Ortiz-Echagüe daría a conocer la arquitectura española fuera de sus fronteras y desarrollaría un papel importante en el intercambio cultural de España y Europa.

El Colegio Santa Teresa de Málaga, obra de Manuel Barbero y Rafael de la Joya, supone uno de los edificios más destacados de la arquitectura escolar española del siglo XX y ha exigido el estudio minucioso de sus características. Este edificio contribuyó al desarrollo de la arquitectura escolar con una organización novedosa que ofrecía nuevas posibilidades didácticas en un entorno de gran riqueza espacial. Incluso, llegaría a convertirse en una referencia internacional a través de su publicación en revistas de distintos países. Los valores de esta obra mantienen su vigencia en la actualidad y merece ser destacada como referencia para el diseño del espacio escolar.

It has been argued by both educationalists and social researchers that visual methods are particularly appropriate for the investigation of people’s experiences of the school environment. The current and expected building work taking place in British schools provides an opportunity for exploration of methods, as well as a need to establish ways to achieve this involvement of a range of school users, including students. This article describes a consultation that was undertaken in a UK secondary school as part of a participatory design process centred on the rebuilding of the school. A range of visual methods, based on photographs and maps, was used to investigate the views of a diverse sample of school users, including students, teachers, technical and support staff and the wider community. Reported here is the experience of using these tools, considering the success of different visually-based methods in engaging a broad cross section of the school community and revealing useful information. Using a range of visual methods allows a complex, but coherent, understanding of the particular school environment to be constructed and developed. It is further argued that such a range of visual and spatial methods is needed to develop appropriate understanding. The study, therefore, contributes to knowledge about specific visual research methods, appreciation of the relationship between tools, and a general methodological understanding of visual methods’ utility for developing understanding of the learning environment.

L’edilizia scolastica è percepita come un'emergenza alla quale dare urgentemente soluzioni certe. Questa consapevolezza sociale diffusa, finalmente in linea con le valutazioni strategiche fornite da Enti sovranazionali come l’OCDE e la UE, fa si che l'edilizia scolastica possa ritornare ad essere uno degli ambiti prioritari di investimento infrastrutturale di promozione di un processo finalizzato anche alla riqualificazione sociale ed educativa del nostro Paese.
School building is perceived as an emergency which urgently requires definite solutions. This widespread social awareness, finally in line with the strategic evaluations supplied by supranational bodies such as the OCDE and the UE, means that school building can return to being one of the priority areas of infrastructural investment for the promotion of a process that is
also aimed at the social and educational redevelopment of our country.

Innovative Learning Environments (ILEs) are characterised by features that can create hypervisibility, and hyperstimulation, that raise psychological safety issues. However, there is a lack of research in the field of ILEs that addresses these complexities especially for students with additional learning needs. This case study draws on interview data with staff and students in a special education setting within an Australian ILE. Results map three aspects of design that have implications for the psychological safety. Findings are presented as a set of indicators that educators and designers can use to assist in their planning for inclusive spaces in ILE.

Salama, A. M. (2004). Viewpoint – Learning Environments: Shaping and Coloring a Bright Future. Architecture+, Issue 6, InHouse Creative, Dubai, United Arab Emirates, PP. 19-21. ISSN # 1684-4084.


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The heritage of school buildings constructed in the 1970s in Turin is one of the most interesting infrastructures of the public city in terms of extension and capillary diffusion across the urban fabric. The school buildings erected in the expansion areas envisioned by the Popular Affordable Housing Plans, which underwent great demographic changes in the last ten years, can be considered a resource for the present-day city. Through archive documents and the analysis of the relationship between built space and teaching styles, the present article explores this theme by looking at two schools in Turin, both of which were taken, at the time of their construction, as models of the relationship between built space and didactics

Les écoles techniques et professionnelles sont-elles des établissements scolaires comme les autres ? Comment y intégrer leur finalité de préparation à des métiers ? Pour éclairer leurs spécificités, ce dossier sur les « lieux de l’enseignement technique » fait dialoguer l’histoire de l’éducation et l’histoire de l’architecture. L’histoire de l’éducation est en effet intéressée par le contexte matériel dans lequel s’inscrit la pédagogie et par les traces laissées par les pratiques afin de vérifier la réalité concrète des politiques éducatives. L’histoire de l’architecture est, quant à elle, attentive à la définition fonctionnelle des locaux, aux politiques de construction, aux enjeux territoriaux et urbains, mais aussi politiques, économiques et sociaux dont sont porteurs les édifices, et que reflètent notamment leur expression architecturale et leurs programmes iconographiques. Menée à plusieurs échelles, l’étude de l’action de promoteurs, de concepteurs et d’usagers est indispensable pour apprécier la diversité des réalisations. Les articles réunis suggèrent ainsi, pour les XIXe et XXe siècles, combien la problématique des lieux est riche pour revisiter la diversité des réalisations et des conceptions qui ont guidé, à diverses échelles, la transmission des savoirs et des savoir-faire techniques et professionnels.