Green Building Design for Schools— The Next Time Around

Abstract

Special care must be applied to the proper planning and design of
public school facilities. Student populations for this age group are prone to
high levels of inner ear deficiencies, and they struggle in difficult acoustical
environments. Additionally, students with asthma conditions must contend
daily in building environments with marginal ventilation systems. What can
be done? Schools must be free from unnecessary ambient noise and indoor
air pollutants. The design professional must provide extraordinary design
leadership through the use of natural daylighting and daylight modeling.
Qualified acousticians should be engaged to evaluate designs for better
learning environments. Operations and maintenance staff can be trained in
the benefits of good indoor air quality. Pesticide and herbicide use can be
reduced or eliminated. Town constituency, school board members, parents,
staff, and students should be educated on the benefits of the LEED initiatives
and the certification process. Since children spend vast amounts of time in
these facilities during critical physical growth periods, they need to be af-
forded the protection of such building design and construction.
Accordingly, in Radnor, Pennsylvania, such an initiative is under-
way—the construction of a LEED-driven middle school with a different
twist. For this project, the school district, the engineer, and the architect
have all completed “green” projects in the last few years. Armed with the
experience of lessons learned, the project team is endeavoring to provide
a high performance school for the township. A school that is not only en-
ergy effi cient, but also healthy, comfortable, well lit, and providing all the
amenities needed for a quality education.
The project team for the Radnor project will discuss “green” features
evaluated and utilized in previous projects. Construction costs and as-
sociated paybacks that make economical sense will be evaluated without
compromising the overall quality of the environment.