McCarthy and DLR Group Team Up on Unique Bay Area School

By Eric Althoff

SAN FRANCISCO—Architecture firm DLR Group and general contractor McCarthy Building Companies have been hired by the San Francisco Unified School District to build a new school in the city’s bustling Mission Bay neighborhood.

The school will encompass 82,000 square feet of educational space on a 2.5-acre parcel of land. The school will eventually be home to 600 preK-5 grade school students, a STEM-focused learning laboratory as well as office space for SFUSD personnel. DLR’s design plan calls for ground-floor learning space that will connect directly to the outdoors to bring learning out of the classroom itself. The second and third floors will feature learning studios as well as collaborative learning spaces and breakout rooms. Meanwhile, the fourth floor will host a learning lab that focuses specifically on guiding high school students to consider potential career options in the STEM fields.

In a recent release from McCarthy, the firm’s vice president, Jack Carter, said that the addition of the new school was necessary as the Mission Bay area of the city has continued its upward swing in development.

“The addition of this vital piece of infrastructure will not only be a cornerstone within Mission Bay but also allows San Francisco Unified School District the opportunity to develop a school from the ground up to provide for today’s and future students,” he said.

Added DLR Group Principal Christopher McGiff-Brown: “The Mission Bay School will become the nucleus of community life within this vibrant neighborhood. Our team’s design solution expresses the joy of learning with dynamic architecture to create a vivid and welcoming campus for all users.”

Construction is scheduled to commence sometime this year, with the school opening its doors in 2025.