Articles
Cost model: School refurbishment
BUILDING • 19 FEBRUARY 2009 • BUILDING, ANDREW HARRISON (DEGW), JOHN MCEVOY AND NICK CHRISCOLI (DAVIS LANGDON) •
Continuing this week’s focus on the renewal of the school estate, Simon Rawlinson and Paul Zuccherelli of Davis Langdon review one of the biggest challenges facing the BSF programme.
01/INTRODUCTION
The rapid acceleration of the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme is demonstrating the benefits of co-ordinated investment in building fabric, IT and new ways of learning. After a slow start, more than 100 schools have been opened since 2008, and a further 120 completions are expected during 2010. With the widening of the “readiness to deliver” assessment to all waves of proposed BSF investment in 2008, a further 18 local education authorities are expected to join the programme before the end of the 2009/10 financial year.
BSF is one manifestation of wider educational reform programmes focused on joining-up services and facilities. The “every child matters” strategy pursued by the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) is aimed at co-ordinating all services focused at children, and the “extended schools programme” is encouraging the development of hub and spoke networks of schools and other community service providers. Some councils are looking to maximise the use of community facilities such as libraries, and as the BSF model matures, a more joined-up approach to using non-school assets could become more common.
Although education falls outside of the government’s “operational efficiency” drive, a greater focus on making the best use of its assets is likely to be an important theme for cash-strapped public bodies. As experience of the implementation of new educational models, such as personalised learning, matures in the UK, capital spending is also likely to be focused more on creating the setting for transforming learning rather than a physical upgrade of the schools estate.
02/THE PLACE OF REFURBISHMENT IN THE BSF PROGRAMME
BSF was intended to put 35% of schools through a thorough remodelling exercise, with a further 15% receiving a lighter “makeover”, comprising repairs and maintenance, decorations and new furniture, fixtures and equipment (FF&E). Given that 70% of schools are more than 25 years old, they are, collectively, a maintenance time bomb. And given the widespread evidence that poor building environments damage educational outcomes, the refurbishment programme could easily end up being focused on solving the bricks and mortar problems.
However, these projects will be central in driving educational transformation, and there is increasing evidence that effective learning can be delivered in refurbished as well as purpose-built space. The DCSF’s Space for Personalised Learning programme is demonstrating that implementation of changes in a school’s learning and organisational models can be effectively supported in existing buildings by intelligent space planning and the use of flexible furniture based on a loose-fit model.
There are many other challenges associated with refurbishment. Given the rapidly evolving sustainability agenda, now driven in part by the Carbon Reduction Commitment, for which councils are liable, BSF will be seen as an unmissable opportunity to decarbonise the schools sector. It will be interesting to see how this affects the refurbishment of historic schools.
Furthermore, in an environment in which public funding will be scarce, a refurbishment-based project portfolio will have to be made attractive to PPP investors, and this will require a flexible approach to risk management.
The Conservative Party is interested in independently managed “free-schools”, which are often set up in buildings that are not purpose-built for education. Independent schools have a history of converting houses for educational use, and there are a growing number of successful conversions of industrial and commercial buildings, which provide effective settings for radically different approaches to teaching and learning. Hellerup School in Copenhagen and Unlimited in Christchurch, New Zealand, illustrate many of the challenges and opportunities.
Small schools projects such as these may not need the full range of support facilities such as sports halls and libraries, so the model relies on effective partnership arrangements with other service providers in the public and private sectors – thereby making better use of existing resources.
Such an approach may not be immediately attractive to an LEA charged with delivering a large-scale BSF programme, but it provides examples of how resources can be shared to support a carefully worked out approach to teaching and learning – something that an authority-wide BSF programme, driven by its continuous improvement targets, should be well positioned to do.
Click here for article reference in the Building Magazine website.