Best Practices in Education and Facilities Design
I really appreciated Prakash Nair’s discussion of “below-the-line architecture”: the idea that our words and actions should be in sync. If we want to nurture skills like compassion, cooperation, and perspective in our students, then the spaces we have our students inhabit for eight hours a day should echo these qualities. Instead, as Nair pointed out, we put students in insecure hallways and windowless, charmless rooms where they have “less space per student per classroom than inmates in high security prisons.”
I loved the picture of Swarthmore’s amphitheather and Nair’s characterization of it as a place “that resonates at a very human level.” Just looking at the picture made me want to spend time in this space. I could imagine myself meditating or reading alone amidst its greenery or becoming absorbed in a concert or play surrounded by equally rapt peers.The concentric circles immediately suggest a sense of community. I’d like to seek out examples of other spaces that “resonate at a human level”…innovative parks, plazas, and other gathering places that inspire their inhabitants through their very layout and design.
