Skip to main content
Add as a preferred source on Google

KI Joins Education Design Research Consortium as Founding Sponsor

  • By Matt Jones
  • 09/17/24

Furniture solutions manufacturer KI recently announced alongside the Center for Advanced Design Research and Evaluation (CADRE) that it will become a founding sponsor for the Coalition for the Advanced Understanding of School Environments (CAUSE). A news release reports that the coalition’s research will focus on the relationship between K–12 physical environments and educational outcomes.

CAUSE members include architecture firms, local school districts, academic institutions, and research organizations, according to the news release. It was founded by researchers from organizations like CADRE, Perkins&Will, Multistudio, HKS, and the Austin Independent School District.

“We're excited to support CAUSE in its mission to use evidence-based insights to improve educational environments,” said KI research manager Jonathan “Juan” Matta. “We're eager to contribute to developing a research tool that will provide critical findings for enhancing how and where students learn.”

The coalition will develop a standardized, open-source, post-occupancy evaluation tool to measure how built environments impact the educational results of K–12 schools. They will consider elements like lighting, acoustics, ergonomic seating, access to nature, and more while creating an initial version of the tool, which will be deployed during a pilot study this fall in a Texas School district. Research will focus on “how school design impacts health and educational performance, establish[ing] data collection protocols for K–12 facilities, and promot[ing] interdisciplinary collaboration and an open-source approach within the industry,” according to the news release.

“Contemporary science is fundamentally a collaborative endeavor. CAUSE represents an industry commitment to working across organizations to generate better data that can improve the positive impacts of design for teachers and students,” said Michael Ralph, one of the coalition’s founding members and vice president at Multistudio. “The strength of our initiative comes from the expertise provided by our many leaders across research and design, and only by pooling our collective wisdom can we advance our efforts toward evidence-driven design excellence.”

About the Author

Matt Jones is senior editor of Spaces4Learning. He can be reached at [email protected].

Featured

  • New Jersey Day School Opens New Science & Entrepreneurship Building

    Saddle River Day School (SRDS) in Saddle River, N.J., recently celebrated the grand opening of the new Dr. Kristen Walsh Hall of Science & Entrepreneurship, according to a news release. The school partnered with DIG Architecture on the 32,000 square foot facility, completed on a 17-month construction timeline in time for the beginning of the new school year.

  • Minnesota District Completes Renovations to 3 Schools

    South Washington County Schools in Woodbury, Minn., recently completed major renovation projects to three of its schools, according to a news release. The district partnered with Kraus-Anderson for construction services, and the upgrades were part of a larger referendum that voters approved in fall 2024.

  • Amazon Expands Lockers to More Than 500 College, University Campuses

    Amazon recently announced that its Locker Network now totals more than 750 locations at more than 500 college and university campuses around the United States, according to a company news release.

  • Q&A: How to Prevent Kitchen Grease Fires in Commercial Kitchens

    School cafeterias and university dining halls serve thousands of meals daily, relying on high-heat equipment like fryers, grills, and ovens. While these operations keep students fed, they also generate significant grease-laden vapors. Without proper controls, this grease becomes a silent fire threat. As a certified exhaust cleaning specialist and business coach who has helped hundreds of institutional facilities achieve NFPA 96 compliance, I emphasize that proactive grease management isn’t optional; it’s a core fire/life safety practice.