School Design Studio

Five Criteria to Consider in Choosing a School

Doug Belshaw writes about five straightforward reasons that would encourage him to accept a head of school position. I think these are good reasons for anyone to choose a school for their child. I'm sure there are others, but these are bad ones to start off with.

1. Geographical location and buildings

By this I don’t mean what village, town or city the school is in; I mean where it is in relation to other things. For example, is there a very deprived estate right next door? Also, are the buildings in good repair? Is there a tangible sense of pride in the buildings? After all, one’s environment affects the way one thinks (or at least it does me…)

2. Pupil-pupil relations

An important thing I do is look at students as they arrive at school. Are there good relationships between students, or is there evidence of stupid and loutish behaviour? Within the school, is there evidence of intimidation and/or bullying? I always speak to students as I go around the school in time that is not allocated to the selection process. It gives a good indicator as students tend to be honest, especially if you haven’t been introduced to them as someone important!

3. Staff-pupil relations

Evidence of the quality of relationships between staff and pupils is evident when just walking around the school. Are students polite? Do they expect, for example, you to get out the way of them? Is there evidence of respect towards members of staff? The best indicator, I feel, is the way that students treat lunchtime supervisors. Another indicator is the interview lesson that you teach: how do they treat you?

4. Quality of the other candidates

It’s fairly evident - even from first impressions - how effective a teacher/leader someone is or has the potential to be. If the people who are being interviewed along with you seem to be - without sounding arrogant - nowhere near as good as you, then this could be an indicator that this particular position might not be a good move for you. It’s not just first impressions that can help here - a chat with your fellow interviewees can tell you a lot about their background. The best positions, I believe, are those you have to fight for.

5. Channels of communication

It’s important that there are clear channels of communication within a school. It can be difficult to ascertain whether this is the case, but there are two ways that I use. Informal questions to staff (for example, when visiting the staff room) and direct questions in the interview to senior members of staff can help with this. Do the latter, for example, impose things, or is there consultation. How well do staff feel that their views are taken on board?

Textbook on Educational Facility Planning

Ken Tanner and I have co-authored the definitive textbook entitled Educational Facilities Planning: Leadership, Architecture and Management. Our essential goal in writing this book on educational architecture is to establish a common language, a Lingua Franca, for better more constructive communication among the various groups and interests involved in planning, designing, constructing, and using educational facilities. We have found that the communication divide between architecture and education, and in general between researchers and practitioners in both fields are as wide as they have ever been, despite sincere, thoughtful and tireless efforts of individuals in both disciplines – many voices of whom we have endeavored to capture in this book. Flowing from our fundamental goal of improved cross-disciplinary communication, are several purposes for writing this book. First, we aim to introduce ideas that encourage people who plan and design physical learning environments to become more responsive to students’ needs and community cultures. Second, we anticipate this book will provide a scholarly reference work for practicing educational leaders and architects that picks up where most guideline books leave off. Finally, we intend for this book to be the primary textbook for students of education architecture and planning who plan to either become school administrators, professional designers or educational researchers.

33 Principles for Educational Design

I have enjoyed reading your "33 Principles of Educational Design". It struck a chord with me because too many times I see designers jumping in and rushing for an 'architectural' result. There are some amazing opportunities out there at the moment, and dare I say it, 'most' are being completely wasted with a lack of proper pre-planning, consultation, and vision. It is very easy to read and understand, and this clarity is obviously intended for its value to educators. I wish that something like this could be distributed to all schools by their respective Departments, just to show what is possible, and what they should expect from their architects.

"Sam Aukland, Principal, Aukland Architecture"