What has Covid taught us about designing schools?

摘要

Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, schools have been balancing safe ways to teach vulnerable and key-worker children with online teaching. But having adjusted their procedures to welcome back all pupils and staff for the winter term, school buildings faced their real acid test from September. Clearly some buildings are better placed to accommodate the required safety protocols than others. Those with flexible space, generous circulation areas and ample room externally with the potential for outside teaching can more easily enable safe movement around the school and make it easier to limit interactions between class or year 'bubbles'. Yet over the last decade, these are the very characteristics that have all too often been squeezed following the demise of the Building Schools for the Future programme in 2010, and the advent of more austere funding measures for new school buildings.