Building schools for a sustainable future
The Government's Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme has been heralded as the 'biggest single investment in improving school buildings for over 50 years'. It has led to a rise in school development and refurbishment, and its legacy means that the construction industry and public sector are now tasked with finding workable, sustainable, and cost-effective solutions to rebuild or renew every secondary school in England over a 10-15 year period.
For the private sector, this programme brings with it both opportunity and a number of significant challenges that simply weren't issues twenty years ago. The provision of workable building solutions needs to be balanced with the practical needs of swift construction and the long-term requirements of the local community as a whole, alongside issues such as climate change, sustainability and the overall 'eco-credentials' of a building. This is where the construction industry and building product manufacturers can link with specifiers and architects to use innovative solutions that will not only deliver schools that offer a pleasant and productive learning environment for students, but also offer a positive experience for all individuals involved in using schools, from teachers, to parents and the wider community. We can already learn from the building products and innovative designs that have been adopted by some BSF-funded educational developments in the UK. One such example is the new 4million pound innovative eco-friendly middle school for St Lawrence College, in Kent, which was completed in September 2006.
Housing over 150 children, the 1,700 sq metre self-contained middle school was designed by Surrey-based architect's consultancy Brodie Plant Goddard, who focused on incorporating a number of innovative features into the structure of the building. The middle school's six classrooms form part of the 2,300 sq metre college campus of interlinked three and two storey buildings, which also incorporates a covered courtyard and specially constructed buble roof. Complete with a sedum green roof, St Lawrence's is heated partly through the solar gain from the bubble roof, and cooled by a specially designed, curved cooling tower, which creates an architectural centrepiece for the courtyard. The classrooms are constructed off the main courtyard to create a barrier to the noise from both neighbouring rooms and the open courtyard space, whilst making the optimum use of the building's footprint.
The building envelope itself was made from Tarmac's Toplite aircrete blocks, a natural choice for the creation of such an adaptable and thermally efficient building. The flexibility offered by the Toplite blocks allowed Brodie Plant Goddard to use one method of construction to create the entire building envelope. Over 2,200 sq meters of Toplite blocks were used to build the walls, floors and ceilings in the main buildings to offer excellent thermal mass performance and durability, and by working closely with Tarmac Topblock's technical teams the designers were also able to use the Toplite blocks to build the special curved cooling tower in the centre of the courtyard.
The choice of a block-based construction method was key to the overall design of the school, as Brodie Plant Goddard's architect, Roger Mahoney explains:"When designing such a unique structure we had to focus on two main areas, the first being to design a sustainable school complex that delivered all of the practical needs of a school whilst creating an inspirational environment for learning. The second, and arguably one of the most important factors, was to design a building that could be constructed in just 12 months, to be operational for the intake of students at the beginning of the new school year.
As with any construction project, balancing building design with the practical elements of labour, timescale and most importantly budget, are all crucial in the selection of the materials. By weighing up these elements, we chose to build the school using Toplite blockwork. From a practical sense, the buildings could be constructed swiftly, creating an overall building skeleton in just a few of months, delivering cost-savings and leaving more time to focus on other areas of the design."
By working with Roger Mahoney and his colleagues at the specification stage, the Topblock team was able to help develop a practical solution that met the construction needs of the project. Backed up by the corporate heritage and strong pedigree of the Tarmac brand, Topblock also worked closely with Barwick Construction - who was awarded the St Lawrence build project in August 2005 - to support the project from conception to delivery.
Trevor Ellingham, Barwick Construction site manager commented: "The design of the school was both unique and challenging from a construction perspective, particularly in relation to the large cooling tower that formed the centre piece of the complex. At the product specification stage, the use of Toplite blocks to construct the tower was not considered. However, due to our experience of block construction and support from Topblock, we demonstrated that the strength, handling benefits and lightweight construction of aircrete blocks were perfect for the job in hand. “We were able to cut and shape the 100mm Toplite blocks to size using hand tools, which helped to reduce the overall cost of the project, while ensuring the tight design specifications and functionality of the tower were not altered. Similarly, when building the roof segments for the single story blocks, we were able to use the blocks in between the beams, and lay the sedum roofing directly on top of them."
This practical application of blocks allowed the school to incorporate the sedum roofing, which absorbs water and emits oxygen as it grows. This in turn improved the environmental performance of the whole building, adding to the eco-friendly design of the school complex. It is therefore clear that in order to deliver a successful BSF programme, knowledge and skills need to be shared by all parties involved in the build process, particularly with regards to the specification of the primary construction methods. As a final point, it is also worth taking into consideration the future needs of a school, as it is essential that materials like Toplite blocks that are used now can stand the test of time in terms of durability and adaptability to climate change and growing pupil numbers.
