Students participating in the Students in Academically Gifted Education (SAGE) program within the North Kansas City School District must have an IQ of 128 and above. Ever since the program’s inception in 1974, it has given these academically gifted students a curriculum that further develops their already advanced skills. Because programming was previously held at varying locations, the district’s approximately 950 SAGE students had been participating in the SAGE program at designated schools — until now.

The Northland Innovation Campus — often referred to as the SAGE Center — in Gladstone, Mo., (a suburb of Kansas City, Mo.) provides a truly innovative space that helps foster the exceptional skills of all 950 SAGE students that come to the facility from 26 schools on a one-day-a-week rotation. The facility pushes the boundaries of education design and serves as a permanent home for the 12 students in third, fourth and fifth grades who participate in the Program for Exceptionally Gifted Students (PEGS) and who have an IQ of at least 140.

“The goal of the SAGE Center was to bring students together so that they could be supported with their like peers, allowing them to talk on the same level and be challenged on their high-achieving levels,” said Dr. Danelle Marsden, principal of gifted programs at the SAGE Center. “Each of the kids is unique and has special needs, so we wanted to foster their uniqueness and develop their individuality. Many students struggle with figuring out where they belong and who they are as individuals, so we want them to work in a student-centered environment specifically designed to meet their needs.”

The SAGE Center’s curriculum uses a STEM approach, emphasizing math and science in a technology-rich space that allows students to research and create, while also supporting the students’ emotional needs by emphasizing individualized learning as well as how to work with others. Because some students are afraid to fail, the program also encourages the idea that “failure is an option” and can in fact stand for something else entirely such as “first attempt in learning,” Marsden said.

That student-centered approach set the stage for the entire project, which ended up mimicking the planning of a contemporary office space more than a traditional educational space. The studio-esque design features very few walls and no specified classrooms in an effort to prepare students for the real world, with a multipurpose hall, learning stairs, studios, outdoor classrooms, video production rooms and lab spaces replacing the traditional school layout.

From Flintstones to Jetsons

The SAGE Center was an interior fit-out project that essentially takes up 3.5 floors of a five-story building originally built as a blank slate. It’s a collaboration of several parties, including the city of Gladstone, North Kansas City School District and Northwest Missouri State, which happens to occupy the top floor of the building.

The project was accomplished in two phases. Completed in August 2016, the first phase included the K-5 portion of the project, for which Chicago-based Perkins+Will served as the design architect, locally based Hoefer Wysocki Architects served as the architect of record and locally based McCownGordon Construction served as the general contractor. The second phase was completed last summer by Hoefer Wysocki, which essentially used the same principles from the K-5 portion and applied it to a middle school portion. All said and done, the K-5 program takes up the first two floors with the middle school taking up floors three and half of the fourth floor.

“The driver of the project was the superintendent of the school district who has since moved on, but at the time, he wanted to do something really innovative and create a space that pushed people out of their boundaries and beyond their preconceived ideas of classrooms and what school space should be for these kids to be more in line with the progressive program,” said Julie Michiels, AIA, senior project designer, associate principal for Perkins+Will. “He wanted to make sure it wasn’t just a replication of what they were already doing but looked at creating something that will really be flexible enough to last for generations to come.”

To accommodate this “school of the future,” Michiels said the design team came up with a Flintstones-to-Jetsons analogy at the get-go, essentially asking the client to rank the project’s innovativeness on a scale that went from a “Flintstones”-era traditional design to a “Jetsons”-era future-thinking design. “At the beginning, we asked them to plot where they were, and they were closer to the Flintstones,” Michiels said. “We kept using that as a measure throughout the project, asking them if we were getting closer to the Jetsons.”

In the end, even the Jetsons themselves would have been impressed with the innovations involved in the center. For instance, the school wanted an open design — more similar to that of a contemporary office — that broke away from the traditional walling off of students in designated classrooms. Even the teachers opted to do away with assigned desks in an effort to allow for more observation and idea sharing.

Michiels said that the teachers and staff were excited that the design would allow kids to be more self-directed because these particular students need access to spaces and tools that are unavailable in a traditional classroom. That includes space for flying drones, teaching students coding skills, a student-run green screen broadcast studio as well as a maker lab.

“It’s a very open-minded program,” Michiels said. “If teachers are giving instructions, they’re generally giving a framework to operate within, not necessarily saying that the students ‘have to do it’ this way, so we wanted the space to serve as a framework that could guide activities without being overly prescriptive about it.”

The Design

Two key design elements were flexibility and visual access. At SAGE, students only spend 5 percent of their time listening to lectures, while the rest of the time is split between doing project-based learning, collaborative group studies and independent studies — all of which require a wide range of learning environments. Wide stairwells create space for chance encounters, while an outdoor patio gives students the chance to learn in an open-air environment. Miniature grandstand seating, built-in nooks and flexible furniture only add to the flexibility.

The school also wanted to encourage curiosity in its students, so the design team used an open layout to create visual access for students to see what other students, older or younger, are doing as well as to see the trees and ravine outside, connecting them to nature. It also wanted the space itself to be a teaching tool, according to Michiels. “We wanted students to wonder what a material is or see something out the window that can be used in a science project,” she said. “We often questioned if we could frame things in a different way for the students that led us to creating a lot of flexibility and visual access.”

To read the entire article, check out the March/April issue of School Construction News.

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The British International School of Houston (BISH) has very strong personalized learning solutions. That’s why when the school decided to build a brand-new campus in Katy, Texas (located just west of Houston), this concept was woven into every design decision.

The curriculum and building itself are created entirely around the needs of the students and their learning, moving from a teacher-driven model to a learner-driven model. “For many years, schools have been built around the needs of the teachers,” said Andrew Derry, principal at BISH. “Teachers have their own room, with their own desk and their own white board, and students move from room to room as they get a year older or as they change subjects. At our campus, the learning environments are far more flexible than that and can change at a [moment’s notice] to suit the needs of the individual learners.”

At first, the teachers were silent when they were told that they wouldn’t have individual classrooms or desks, but they quickly started to embrace the building, Derry said.

The new 280,000-square-foot facility was designed to accommodate these new learning models; however, the school also needed to transfer from its previous northwest Houston facility because it was experiencing flooding, according to Van Martin, chairman and CEO of Tribble & Stephens Construction Ltd., the locally based general contractor on the project. The Indianapolis office of Fanning Howey served as architect of record through a joint venture with locally based House+Partners Architecture. Construction began in January 2015.

Completed in time for the 2016-17 school year, the facility serves as the North American flagship campus for Hong Kong-based Nord Anglia Education. It is an international school, particularly popular among expats living in Houston who are looking for the continuity of a British curriculum for their children.

More than 50 nationalities attend the school, with a majority of students being British, but students don’t have to be expats to attend. In fact, the school’s reputation is so strong that it’s considered a premiere private school in the Houston area, according to Dan Mader, AIA, ALEP, and principal at Fanning Howey. Its popularity was another reason for the new school, which increased the school’s capacity from 850 at its previous location to 2,000.

The BISH curriculum brings engagement and a broad range of programs for students from the very start of Pre-K through 12th grade. “The Early Years program is fairly unique for schools of this kind,” Mader said. “It’s integrated as a continuum of their curriculum — not just as a means to take care of Pre-K kids.”

The school particularly emphasizes a project-based learning approach to teaching science, technology, engineering, arts and math (STEAM). An ever-growing partnership with Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and The Juilliard School continue to redefine those methods of teaching and learning. Not only do teachers participate in workshops at MIT to get ideas for the curriculum, but students also get the opportunity to visit MIT to immerse themselves in a culture of hands-on problem-solving. Similarly, the school’s music program is curated by Juilliard and is designed around 12 categories for students to explore a wide variety of musical genres, styles and cultures.

Designing for the Curriculum

The school’s British curriculum — which relates more to a holistic view of the student, rather than a compartmentalized one — played a major role in the design, addressing two major themes: personalized learning and transparency.

“The main goal of the project was to design and build a genuine ‘school of the future,’” said Derry.

The entire facility is centralized around a four-story atrium that includes a second-floor university-level research commons called the Agora, surrounded by 16 flexible academic neighborhoods. From there, teachers are assigned to a neighborhood, and in that neighborhood, there are a variety of different types of furniture and learning areas that can be customized to the needs of the students learning in that neighborhood.

The school features a wide variety of spaces for project-based learning. A two-story science center features laboratories and student-centered forums. There’s a Design Technology Center with CAD lab studios, 3D printers, print media and laser-printing studios as well as three MIT-influenced Makerspaces.

“We work closely with MIT on our Design Thinking curriculum,” said Derry. “This includes elements of entrepreneurial challenges, coming up with new ideas, failing, rethinking, pivoting, failing and failing again. This is probably the biggest thing we have learned — the importance of failure and pivoting.”

The “arts” portion of the STEAM curriculum doesn’t disappoint either. Designed in collaboration with The Juilliard School, BISH’s Performing Arts Center features a theater, black-box theater, choral rooms, a dance studio, and keyboard- and strings-instrument laboratories. There is also an Aquatics Center with learn-to-swim and competition pools as well as extensive outdoor sports fields, including FIFA-regulation soccer pitches and a varsity stadium.

And all of this project-based learning is also put on display due to the requirement that 50 percent of the walls in the facility be entirely made of glass. “There was always a desire for transparency so that, as you’re in the building, people can see education taking place, and students see their peers engaged in learning from a motivational standpoint,” said Mader. “That’s a pretty strong attribute for a building to have.”

There are also academic wings that feature what the school calls “learning communities” — each with a variety of breakout areas that act as project-based learning centers in each academic core, according to Mader. Hand-held devices and high-tech equipment also encourage learning to occur anywhere throughout the building.

“There was very much a focus on flexibility and future proofing, knowing that if the school wants to be cutting edge from a technology perspective, administrators have to acknowledge that changes [will occur],” Mader said. “You have to build that in from a concept standpoint so that it’s easy to update and that the backbone and technology foundation is strong enough for whatever changes they will make in the future.”

Derry said that the students had the biggest impact on the design. “We worked with various groups of students on many areas of the school. As an example, we set a capstone project for a group of juniors,” Derry said. “They worked for a week in the summer in the offices of the architects who designed the building. We then gave them a budget and let them design a major part of the outside garden and farm. Some of those student now have places to study architecture at the university level.”

To read the entire article, check out the July/August issue of School Construction News.

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CORINTH, Maine — The new 97,000-square-foot Central Community Elementary School in Corinth was constructed to consolidate five rural elementary schools into one energy-efficient building. Its design not only includes better operating systems, but also offers more programming space to give the district’s PreK-5 students more educational opportunities.

Brewer, Maine-based Nickerson & O’Day Inc. completed construction on the nearly $21.4 million facility in time for the 2016-17 school year, while Harriman, with offices in Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, served as the architect. The new school serves approximately 530 students from the towns of Bradford, Corinth, Hudson, Kenduskeag and Stetson, replacing each town’s outdated elementary school.

“This was an opportunity for the district to consolidate all schools into one brand-new school located in Corinth, where the middle school and high school were already located,” said Jeff Larimer, AIA, principal for Harriman. “Some of the schools [had enrollments of] less than 100 students each, so it brought all the students together and shut down these tiny elementary schools that had no gyms, cafeterias or libraries and created a new school that had all the amenities [the district] needed.”

All-Inclusive Design Process

Harriman applied an all-inclusive approach to the design process by distributing questionnaires to school representatives and staff to elicit specific feedback on individual classrooms and other spaces. The next step was conducting one-on-one interviews to meet with as many staff members as possible to talk about the building’s overall design.

“This provides a lot of input in terms of design information as well as part of the programming aspect, so we have a clear understanding of the size of spaces needed,” Larimer said.

He added that some of the existing schools lacked many critical spaces. In one school operating without a cafeteria, lunches were brought in daily from the nearby middle school and students had to eat at their desks. Other schools didn’t even offer a library and instead relied on periodic visits from a bookmobile.

New Opportunities

Harriman designed the new facility to include a two-story classroom wing that is separate from non-academic spaces. Kindergarten and grades one and two take up classrooms on the first floor, while fourth and fifth grade students are housed on the second floor. Five classrooms per grade level are arranged in clusters to support teacher collaboration. There are also dedicated rooms for special education services and gathering spaces to accommodate multiple classes for common programs.

Perhaps the most significant advantage of the new elementary school is that it gives PreK-5 students access to more amenities than were available in the smaller, individual elementary schools. That includes everything from art and music rooms to a cafeteria and gymnasium, as well as a PreK program space that had not previously been available in any of the schools.

“We were looking for a building that could support students in ways that they didn’t have in the others,” said Rhonda Sperrey, superintendent of schools for RSU No. 64. “For instance, there wasn’t physical therapy or occupational therapy available for special-education students, and we didn’t have space for a prekindergarten program; however, we were able to add that to our existing programs with the addition of this facility.”

Most of these newer program spaces are situated in the interdisciplinary wing, which connects to the academic wing. Also included in this area are a cafeteria with a full-production kitchen and a gymnasium. These two spaces in particular are linked by a common stage for school events. The cafeteria can also be divided into two smaller spaces for more flexibility of use.

When the school opened, approximately 530 students were in attendance, but the new school is designed to accommodate 580 if needed in the future, Larimer said.

Read more about this project in the January/February issue of School Construction News, available now.

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The $26.5 million project expands upon the network, offering a newer, less conservative design. Not only did KIPP:NJ want more classroom space, but it also wanted more public space and a strong emphasis on athletics — with an athletic field and a gymnasium incorporated, as well as space for students to practice mind and body wellness.

Boonton, N.J.-based Phelps Construction Group started construction of the school in September 2015. The firm provided pre-construction, construction management and design-build services, with Princeton, N.J.-based KSS Architects serving as the architect. The new facility features classrooms, science rooms, a performing arts area, a library and a full-service kitchen. Its gymnasium, cafeteria and turf field are also available to students as well as to the local community during off hours.

“The school made strategic decisions to make more ‘net-to-grow’ space that can be used for much more purposes that the students really benefit from,” said Merilee Meacock, AIA, LEED AP, partner for KSS Architects.

Double the Population

The school was originally designed as a three-story building with an adjacent gym, but KIPP:NJ decided to double its population to allow more students to benefit from its two rare amenities for urban schools: an athletic field and parking. As such, KSS Architects and Phelps Construction Group worked together to find a cost-effective way to add an additional two floors for future classroom space over the proposed gymnasium.

The final design includes a long four-story building, which features residential-sized windows in order to work with the scale of neighboring buildings. The building is split into two wings — one containing a cafeteria, office space and library with three levels of classrooms above, and the other containing the two-story gymnasium and two floors of classrooms that have yet to be fitted out.

Sports & Community

Like several urban charter schools within the school district, Newark Collegiate Academy teaches students about healthy eating as well as encourages yoga and meditation. “A lot of charter schools try to support the family not just the students,” said Meacock. “This particular school was very focused on athletics.”

Before building the collegiate academy, however, students had to take a bus to get to athletic facilities, which meant more time in transit and less time on the field. This emphasis on dedicated time for athletics and wellness became a major focus for the facility and yet another opportunity for community engagement.

Technology & Efficiencies

For this project, Phelps said that the project team saw a lot of emphasis on well-equipped science and art classrooms, and even traditional classrooms feature smart boards and other modern teaching technologies. Meacock added that the KIPP:NJ network uses iPads dispersed from iPad carts that can move throughout the facility.

“They’re making [technology and design] decisions that include much more amenities,” Meacock said.

With regard to technology, ample communication and data infrastructure was built into the school, according to Phelps. That includes smart boards and wireless connections for computer use, but also behind-the-scenes mechanical systems and energy recovery units on the roof.

Phelps added that lighting throughout the building is extremely efficient and works in tandem with the building’s unique design. All classroom light fixtures are high-performance recessed 2×4 units, which help eliminate shadows in low-ceiling applications, while the corridor’s linear fixtures play on the building’s unique angles. This concept also carried into the gym where the linear fixtures are suspended from the structure in an angled pattern and are not typical dome fixtures.

With all of the advanced design elements and technologies, the project created a variety of spaces that encourage students to learn outside the confines of traditional education, while also welcoming public involvement. It’s a win-win for both KIPP:NJ and the local community.

Read more about the Newark Collegiate Academy project in the November/December issue of School Construction News, now available.

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