Trends in K-12 Building Design for 2025 and Beyond
By Jennette La Quire
Today’s teachers and students aren’t tethered to a wall by technology. Nor do they embrace a traditional, one-sided classroom. New pedagogies and learning styles — i.e., visual, kinetic, contemplative and collaborative — are shaping not only the way teachers teach, but the way we design the spaces in which education flourishes. The freedom and challenge of creating forward-thinking and effective school design involves understanding and incorporating a range of teaching styles and priorities into each reenvisioned classroom. Of course, administrators must also navigate the funding hurdles of building or renovating these spaces. As pedagogies, technologies and funding requirements evolve, here’s what’s trending in the K-12 school design landscape for 2025 and beyond.
Flexible, Resilient Spaces
Every corner, wall and inch of today’s classroom has the potential to be functional. Designing four-sided classrooms that allow for collaborative projects as well as individualized learning (in all its forms) requires flexibility. In terms of today’s layout, that may mean creating breakout spaces for quiet moments where students can read and focus while retaining visible connectivity for teachers to observe what’s happening in those areas. Another option to shape learning spaces differently involves clustering classrooms (while still meeting square-footage requirements) and dividing that larger space into both contemplative and collective learning environments.
When looking at the big picture, the focus on flexibility isn’t a short-term design commitment. Today’s buildings need to be designed so that they can be inexpensively renovated 50 years from now. To that end, today’s designers are focusing on the following:
- Creating flexible floor plates where load-bearing walls don’t stand in the way of reconfiguring future spaces
- Implementing HVAC and technology systems that are designed with an eye for change over time
- Feeding the underground infrastructure and utilities to a location within the building that can be an easy point of connection and allows for future reconfiguration
Building with resilience in mind is not only forward-thinking but also cost-effective. Often a new build is not in the budget, so designers can look to current structures to determine if the existing infrastructure can support new educational goals. To repurpose or modernize a building, we look for good bones, robust building materials and, of course, ways to flex the space, either by adding partitions or removing non-load-bearing walls. For example, HED’s redesign of Santa Monica High School Discovery Building incorporated potentially demountable interior walls among other highly adaptable elements. Given that technology paves the way for much of the evolution of learning, upgrading Wi-Fi and creating space for IT infrastructure is a key component in current and future school design.
Leveling up the CTE Experience
Particularly at the high school level, career technical education (CTE) is seeing a huge resurgence. At HED, we’re designing everything from robotics labs and metal, wood and autobody shops to electrician spaces and agricultural facilities. In terms of design, this resurgence doesn’t just involve the hands-on mechanics of CTE learning, but also an elevated, integrated design that allows students to hone these skills in a forward-looking setting.
Working with one’s hands involves having technology at one’s fingertips, which means building labs that combine all of these elements. For example, a drafting lab incorporates the fundamentals of learning how to draw and design, plus a computer software component and a fabrication element. Students start with the basics, get a feel for the technology and, ultimately, their drawings come to life through 3D printing or implementation through the use of a CNC machine.
By leveling up the CTE experience, students get real world experience in a range of areas of expertise. For example, at the San Marcos Unified School district’s new agriculture building, students learn not only the theory and practice of how to humanely raise animals, but also how to bring them to market.
Embracing Sustainability and the Outdoors
As stewards of the environment, educators and architects have a common goal of creating learning spaces that are healthy, energy efficient and sustainable. Therefore, both old-school and innovative eco-friendly design elements are trending in school buildings across the nation as we work toward net-zero, carbon neutrality and American Institute of Architects’ 2030 goals.
On the back-to-basics side of the equation, we’re seeing tried-and-true design elements, such as a reinvention of the passive heating and cooling techniques of the past. Daylighting, in lieu of energy-heavy artificial illumination, is also making a comeback. Innovations, such as displacement ventilation, which delivers slow-velocity air in a low-to-high manner, creates healthier and more efficient ventilation than traditional HVAC systems. Photovoltaics (PVs) are being implemented into shade structures as well as rooftops, particularly in states like California where PV is required on new builds per the state code.
In mild climates, a move toward indoor-outdoor classrooms is also gaining traction. When deliberately integrated into the learning experience, this design shift goes well beyond connecting a classroom to a patio via a garage door. These outdoor spaces, such as HED’s Jefferson Elementary School Outdoor Learning project (part of the San Francisco Unified School District), are both functional and comfortable. Depending on what’s being taught in the space, different tools and design elements, such as tables, shade, shelter from the wind or a weather-resistant whiteboard, may be part of the outdoor classroom. These spaces can also provide collaborative areas for louder and messier projects than indoor classrooms.
Student Wellbeing and Safety without Fences
Students need to be able to come and go without feeling like they’re imprisoned. As architects, we are discovering ways to build safe learning spaces without just putting up bars and eliminating windows. We must ask: Can a building have a single point of entry when students are in class? Could we design windows so that there’s always visibility from an entry point? Can classroom doors be lockable from the inside? Are we able to design refuge at the rear of the classroom or underneath windows? In the landscape between classrooms, are there ways to create spaces that provide duck-and-cover shelter, such as shrubbery or benches? Thinking beyond fences is important. It’s our job to create spaces where kids feel like they can learn while also ensuring their safety.
The Takeaway for School Decision-makers
No matter how flexible, resilient, innovative, sustainable and safe a learning space may be, communication is the key to unlocking the best school design. When designers are given direct access to teachers, our number one job is to listen. If we can garner a clear understanding of how an educator teaches and what their goals and passions are, we can design a space that enhances the learning experience exponentially.
For example, in conversations with a woodshop teacher about his dreams for his classroom, our team was able to tap into his desire to teach a sustainable curriculum and build a sense of community for his students outside of class time. So, with a nod to sustainability, we modernized the building while highlighting curriculum-related elements, such as putting up plexiglass over exposed wood studs or opening up the ceiling to reveal duct work and conduits. The building became a teaching tool. We also removed outdated ductwork in the mezzanine to create a cyber café where students could hang out, study and socialize. That initial conversation transformed what would have been a good space into a great learning environment.
Jennette La Quire is a principal and serves as pre-K-12 business leader at HED.
This article originally ran in the November/December digital edition of School Construction News.