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Good teachers and motivated students can overcome inadequate facilities and perform at a high level almost anywhere, but a well-designed facility can truly enhance performance and make education a more enjoyable and rewarding experience. The following features define a high performance school. Healthy High indoor environmental quality is essential. The significant amount of time that students and teachers spend inside schools during the course of their educational career, combined with children's increased susceptibility to indoor pollutants underlines the importance of healthy schools. Comfortable Comfort includes thermal, visual, and acoustic comfort. Thermal comfort means that teachers, students and administrators should be neither hot or cold as they teach and learn. Visual comfort means that quality lighting makes visual tasks, such as reading and following classroom presentations, easier. The lighting for each room is "designed," not simply specified. Daylight and electric light are integrated, and glare is eliminated. Visual comfort also means providing a connection to the out-of-doors and visual stimulation through the use of eye level windows. Acoustic comfort means teachers and students can hear one another. Loud ventilation systems are eliminated, and the school minimizes outdoor and indoor noise from reaching the classroom. Energy Efficient Energy efficient schools save money while conserving nonrenewable energy resources and reducing atmospheric emissions. A high performance heating/ventilating/air-conditioning (HVAC) system uses high efficiency equipment, is "right sized" for the estimated demands of the facility, and includes controls that boost system performance. The school's lighting system uses high efficiency lamps and ballasts, optimizes the number of light fixtures in each room, incorporates controls that ensure peak system performance, and successfully integrates electric lighting and daylighting strategies. The walls, floors, roofs, and windows of the school are as energy efficient as is feasible. The building shell integrates and optimizes insulation levels, glazing, shading, thermal mass, air leakage, and light-colored exterior surfaces. Material Efficient To the maximum extent possible the school incorporates materials and products that are durable, nontoxic, derived from sustainable yield processes, high in recycled content, and easily recycled themselves. Water Efficient Water scarcity is a major problem in much of California. High performance schools are designed to use water efficiently, saving money while reducing the depletion of aquifers and river systems. The school uses as little off-site water as possible to meet its needs, controls and reduces water runoff from its site, consumes fresh water as efficiently as possible, and recovers and reuses gray water to the extent feasible. Easy to Maintain and Operate Building systems are simple and easy to use. Teachers have control over the temperature and lighting in their classrooms, and are trained how to most effectively use them. Commissioned The school operates the way it was designed to and meets the needs of the owner. This is made possible by implementing a formal commissioning process—a form of "systems check" for the facility. The process tests, verifies, and fine-tunes the performance of key building systems so that they perform at the highest levels of efficiency. Environmentally Responsive Site To the extent possible, the school's site conserves existing natural areas and restores damaged ones, minimizes storm water runoff and controls erosion, and enhances the school building's high performance features. A Building That Teaches By incorporating important concepts such as energy, water, and material efficiency, schools can become tools to illustrate a wide spectrum of scientific, mathematic, and social issues. Mechanical and lighting equipment and controls can be used to illustrate lessons on energy use and conservation, and daylighting systems can help students understand the daily and yearly movements of the sun. Safe and Secure Students and teachers feel safe anywhere in the building or on the grounds. A secure environment is created be optimizing opportunities for natural surveillance, reinforcing a sense of territoriality, and controlling access. Security technology is used to enhance, rather than substitute for, the design features. High performance does not compromise safety. Community Resource The most successful schools have a high level of parent and community involvement. This involvement can be enhanced if schools are designed to be used for neighborhood meetings and other community functions. Stimulating Architecture High performance schools should invoke a sense of pride and be considered a genuine asset for the community. Adaptable to Changing Needs. High performance schools need to be able to embrace new technologies and respond to demographic and social changes.
Creating a school with these characteristics is not difficult, but it does require an integrated, "whole building" approach to the design process. Key systems and technologies must be considered together, from the beginning of the design process, and optimized based on their combined impact on the comfort and productivity of students and teachers. At the end of the process the entire facility will be optimized for long-term performance. The result will be a finished school that is an enduring asset to its community: one that enhances teaching and learning, reduces operating costs, and protects the environment. To clarify these qualitative definitions, CHPS is developing a certification system that explicitly defines a high performance school while remaining flexible to accommodate a particular district's needs. The system is a tool to streamline the design process. Districts can use it to clearly communicate their design goals and verify the final performance of the facility. Designers can use the system to set their timelines, budget, and priorities. In addition, both parties can use it to resolve trade-offs necessary to complete the project on time and within budget. |
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