Skip to main content
Add as a preferred source on Google

Key Design Features for Innovative Schools

  • By Dietmar Lang
  • 03/01/18

Educational spaces and modern school furniture design continue to evolve. Here are some design features that innovative schools utilize to achieve success.

Versatility in Design

Why it’s important: Numerous studies have shown the correlation between student well-being and flexible, ergonomic seating options. The best furniture design maximizes the potential for diverse uses and can be reconfigured to better suit both the user and the environment.

How it’s done: Stackable desks, mobile storage units, and easily foldable, storable teaching accessories are ways that furniture design is transforming educational settings.

Coherence of Furnishings and Environment

Why it’s important: Modern classrooms are typically single spaces used for various activities. When students feel their environment is purposeful and they’re prepared for the task at hand, the learning experience is dramatically improved.

How it’s done: Balance in design that extends to both environment and furnishings is achieved by evaluating space and choosing furniture that supports a diversity of tasks and activities.

Private and Public Space

Why it’s important: When students are kept in one position, energy and attention can lag. By contrast, motion allows for times of productive and reflective individual work as well as networking and team-driven activities that teach social skills.

How it’s done: Mobile dividers and movable furniture solutions instantly transform spaces from individual-focused to social and group-oriented. By allowing furniture design to organically promote authentic collaboration, students can feel more comfortable and adept in a variety of learning styles and situations.

This article originally appeared in the School Planning & Management March 2018 issue of Spaces4Learning.

About the Author

Dietmar Lang is the director of Marketing & Product for VS America. He can be contacted at [email protected].

Featured

  • Indiana University Launches Capital Campus in D.C.

    Indiana University recently held a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new IU Capital Campus in Washington, D.C., according to university news. The eight-story facility will provide a central hub for the university’s existing programs and business operations based in D.C., uniting them under one roof and providing the opportunity to expand.

  • Classical building columns display digital data streams

    The Campus Nervous System: Why Facilities Risk Is Now a Leadership Issue in Higher Education

    Facility performance now intersects with safety, compliance, on-campus experience, institutional reputation, and financial resilience. That places it firmly on the leadership agenda.

  • California High School Opens New Classroom Building for 7th-, 8th-Graders

    Santa Rosa City Schools in Santa Rosa, Calif., recently announced the completion of a new classroom building for Piner High School. As the campus transitions to a Junior/Senior High School, the facility will play home to the school’s new population of seventh- and eighth-grade students.

  • Designing for Every Mind

    Learning environments have the power to shape not just what students know, but who they become. When a school is designed with genuine empathy—for the full range of ways students think, sense, and engage with the world—it becomes more than a building. It becomes a catalyst for growth, confidence, and belonging. That is the animating idea behind neurodiverse design, and it is one that is transforming how more architects and designers are thinking about school design.