Introduction

Many headteachers are overjoyed when told that their school will be subject to a major refurbishment project. They understand that this is a wonderful chance to create a new learning environment fit for the 21st century. Yet with opportunity comes the responsibility to get it right, not just for their current students, staff and community, but for generations to come. It can be an overwhelming experience.

Once the school is part of the process, the headteacher will understandably be under pressure to deliver the best possible building for the available funding. But where do they start? What should their new school look like? How can they anticipate the changes and challenges that the future may bring? Perhaps the only certainty in education is that things change. Learning and teaching is unlikely to look the same even in ten years’ time.

While many headteachers may have spent years dreaming about what they would like to change in their school if they had the resources to fundamentally reshape their spaces. They will still need time, support and expertise to help them think through every aspect and how to translate their vision into a brief for architects. The starting point is often a lightbulb moment – they realise that they don’t need to design their own school, they just need to set out very clearly in a comprehensive brief how the school will operate and what they want the spaces to do.

This chapter explores what the brief needs to cover and draws on examples of how proper preparation and a detailed brief at the outset can ensure the school gets the very best from the design process.

What is a brief?

The briefing document can be called a number of different things depending on the procurement process. Most commonly it will be known as the client brief, school specific design brief (SSDB) or education design brief (EDB). Whatever the name, it is the key document that will specify, clearly and with identified priorities, what the school needs from its building to be able to deliver high quality teaching and learning. It should:

The brief should therefore include a comprehensive review of the school, its context and its educational goals so the design team can quickly get a real understanding of how to meet the needs identified. Key information will include:

The place of technology

All too often ICT is considered only as an afterthought. With the increasing importance of technology in learning, it is vital that the role of ICT is discussed and understood early in the design process.

Detail about how new technologies should be integrated throughout the school will be a key element of the brief. Many schools, for example, are moving away from ICT suites, except for use in specialist teaching such as media, graphics and music technology, instead opting for handheld devices. These bring new requirements for charging points, storage and security that need to be understood early and built into the scheme.

Managing expectations

It is good to be ambitious, but there are always parameters within which the project needs to be delivered – time, budget, site and phasing constrains for example. Setting out clearly in the EDB what are ‘must haves’ and what are ‘nice to haves’ helps focus the discussions. Enabling pupils, staff, governors and parents to give their views can also create ownership and understanding at an early stage of the process.

As in any large-scale project, compromise will be necessary at some point in the process. Knowing where compromises can be made while ensuring the project delivers the vision is a key part of the leadership role.

Many senior leaders will only be involved in one major school capital project in their careers, and it’s a steep learning curve. Making sure they understand the process they are about to embark on is important. It should be made clear that elements of the brief are likely to evolve and change through a collaborative design process, but only as the implications of any major amendments are considered and agreed by the school representatives. A key to success will be choosing architects who not only bring design expertise but who also want to get to know the school and its needs quickly. The early part of this relationship is critical and worth spending time on. School leaders are often used to being in control, but adopting a collaborative approach will allow the client to understand what is being asked of them, question and share with the designers, and help get the best from the project.

Using the information in the brief to test and evaluate emerging designs will create a common language and shared understanding. Where there is no brief, or it is very general and lacks detail, architects will they tend to struggle with what is really wanted.

Trung Le, author of The Third Teacher, says that by describing a student’s typical intended learning experience (as well as the philosophical and pedagogical approaches being considered by the school for the new building), the school is challenging the architect to think more carefully and consider a range of creative responses:

Le compares it to people buying a kitchen for their home where, typically they think of everything – the number of people the kitchen has to cater for; the type of energy; the location of the sink; the number, type and size of the appliances; the storage required; the finished trim; the flooring; whether there will be tiles; the height of the worktops; the colours and finishes; the location of lighting and power sockets and so on.

Designing a school should require the same level of detailed thinking and it is crucial that the headteacher is aware of how the design will transform from a blank sheet of paper to a building ready for occupation, and their contribution to making that happen.

Preparing a detailed brief allows the architects to really understand the school, but good architects will want to come and join in with the school community to get the full experience and broaden their understanding. Shadowing students and staff for a day is one way to do that.

Getting started

It is a good idea for schools to get thinking about the project as early as possible. Some schools keep initial discussions between just governors and the headteacher, others form a small project group. There is no right answer, but every school needs to think carefully about how they are going to manage resources, get a good input of different views and expertise, and determine who will ultimately be responsible for decision making.

Usually just one or two people from the school attend the design sessions with the architect. It is always preferable that it should be the same individuals at every meeting to ensure consistency, and it also helps if these representatives are decision makers. They may also want to designate another senior member of staff who acts as school project manager, dealing with the day-to-day issues associated with the design and delivery of the school project.

Writing the brief can be a useful collaborative process for the school, encouraging debate and crystallising priorities. However, it can also be challenging if the school is already stretched in terms of time and resources. Many schools will work with an external education consultant tasked with pulling the document together by questioning, challenging, pressing for detail and then drafting a full detailed design brief. If this is the case, the headteacher will still need to make time to assure themselves that the document fully reflects their school and community.

Gathering evidence

Prior to writing the brief the school might find it helpful to visit other new schools or public buildings such as libraries, and further and higher education institutions. Typically secondary schools will visit other schools, office buildings and colleges as they consider bringing in more adult work environments, but they should not be limited to these. In order to get inspiration and ideas for buildings to visit they should ask architects, school groups, local authorities, and other headteachers who have been through the process.

It is important that visits are well-planned and that the participants do their homework before they go – there is nothing more frustrating than spending a day out of school to see something with little relevance. It is worth being prepared to travel to undertake these visits as there is good practice all over the UK. Ask to meet with a range of people who can give an honest assessment of how successful the building is. The headteacher, subject leaders, business manager, students and site manager will each give a different perspective on how well the spaces work educationally, pastorally, environmentally and as a workplace. Seeing things which work less well can be just as important in knowing what to avoid.

One secondary school headteacher spent some time studying how motorway service stations processed huge numbers of people in the food court in a short space of time, to see if there were lessons she could learn for her new school build project. This may seem unusual, but it helped her define different food service points and circulation routes in a large school project.

Getting it right

Sister Anne-Marie Niblock of Notre Dame RC Girls School in the London Borough of Southwark was rigorous in her preparations for her school’s new build. Her understanding of the project and eye for detail helped make the process a success. When it was confirmed that her school was to receive a significant extension as part of the BSF programme, she started her research long before any element of the design process started, including before the development of the brief.

Every aspect of the learning spaces was looked at. This included:

With so much work done, Sister Niblock knew an enormous amount about all aspects of learning spaces and, as a result of this meticulous preparation and the schools’ refusal to compromise on key issues, she got what she needed for her students. Sister Niblock’s advice to all school leaders expecting major capital investment is clear:

During the design process for the new Tottenham University Technical College (TUTC), having a clear and comprehensive brief helped get the best possible outcome from the project. This new school for students aged 14–18 is sponsored by university and industry partners, and specialises in technology and science for sport, health and engineering. Students follow the national curriculum but also spend 40% of their time working on the specialism. Although the average size of UTC’s is normally 600 students, TUTC is design for over 920 students.

With TUTC spread over two floors, sandwiched between a supermarket and offices, the brief had to carefully consider each and every space, describing the types of activities that would take place in them. This is not a standard school and every space had to be as flexible as possible. The brief was clear that to support the UTC approach:

So that the brief remained central to the process, the person responsible for writing it also chaired the design user group (DUG), which met regularly with the design team to develop and approve the final plans for the UTC.

Since opening, the UTC has been positively received by students and staff, with the most frequently heard comment being that it does not look or feel like a school.

Getting it wrong

Even after this level of detailed preparation things can go wrong. The apparently minor oversight can make life difficult for teachers if not resolved.

Examples include:

These sorts of issues can be anticipated and included in the brief to avoid unexpected and often costly mistakes coming to light once the school is built.

Preparing staff

There have been many cases where schools have created a range of innovative teaching spaces to meet their needs for future learning. However, problems can arise when teachers who have not been involved in the design process try to use the spaces without proper training and discussion.

Staff may find it a challenge to move from a familiar school environment to one designed specifically to support innovative new teaching and learning strategies. To tackle this dilemma, a number of schools have found it helpful to develop a test room for staff to try different approaches to learning, new equipment, furniture, and technology well in advance of their move. Building this sort of activity into the school CPD in the 12 months before a major change, supports staff in thinking about how their practice may have to change in the future.

Managing wider engagement

Schools will have a varied approach to consultation at the beginning of the design process, and there is no right answer. Some schools really believe in consultation with students and staff with the aim of making the whole process a unique learning opportunity at every stage. Others limit the process to a very small senior team, bringing staff and students in at specific points in the process. What is important is that each school thinks about who to involve, when and why, and that they develop a comprehensive communications strategy. This is an exciting opportunity and, if managed thoughtfully, can energise the whole school community.

Often headteachers comment that it is not worth consulting existing students as they will have left by the time any new building is completed. While quite possibly true, as the current users of the school they will have a view about how well it works and what they would like to see in new facilities. Many students will have younger siblings who will benefit from the new facilities when they are completed and they may well, in a few years’ time, send their own children to the school.

In secondary schools, specialist staff are more likely to be consulted early on, but they need to understand the context and the vision for the school. All too often staff are brought in for just one meeting, in isolation to whole discussion about the long-term plans for the school, and instead base their input on their knowledge of current spaces and teaching practice.

The advantage of having an experienced headteacher in the lead role during the process is that they know and can manage the staff extremely well and tend to be familiar with the phased introduction of new systems. However, the headteacher will not be at the school forever, and the brief acts as a helpful audit tool, explaining why design decisions have been made so that successors can fully understand the thinking behind particular spaces.

There may well be other important stakeholders in the design, including the wider community, who need to be part of the process. The aspirations and impact of these wider consultations may be limited by budget constraints.

Measuring success

An area rarely considered in a brief is how the school plans to judge the effectiveness of their new learning spaces and what impact they have had on educational delivery. If the new building does not contribute anything to the success of student outcomes was there any point in building it?

How will the school judge success? Is it the environmental factors; improved light, temperature, air quality? Is it better attendance, reduced incidence of bad behaviour or better exam results? Higher staff satisfaction or higher staff retention? Having a clear idea about what represents success will help the leadership team understand how the desired building will support that vision.

Conclusion

For most school senior leaders this will be a once in a career opportunity. It is daunting but also exciting. Being challenged to think ten, 20 or 50 years into the future provides time and space to question what you do and how you do it. Given that this will have to be undertaken on top of a full-time job, involving the wider school community will provide a rich source of ideas and develop their ownership of the new spaces. This will help smooth the transition when the time comes.

A school is not just a building so using the briefing process to have conversations about what learning needs to be like in the future will help everyone to understand that it is a change process for the benefit of all involved.

References

OWP/P Architects (2010). The Third Teacher. Published by Harry N. Abrams, Inc.