Creating Innovative Spaces to Enhance Equity & Belonging

Outline

Introductions (10 minutes)
We will open with an audience poll (Mentimeter or Slido) to determine who is in the audience, what type of innovative space they are here to plan (new school, addition, renovation, classroom redesign), and where they are in the planning (still dreaming, about to start planning, in the middle of planning, needing to retrofit). Our final question will ask for their feelings about their project and result in a word cloud. There will be chart paper survey posters for participants who prefer not to respond electronically or who do not have a device.

Background (25 minutes)
Using information from the opening polls, we will frame the following content:

• We will show a quick slideshow of Ehrman Crest Elementary & Middle School, cited by Time as one of the 200 best inventions on 2022 and featured in Smithsonian magazine for its “innovative blend of children’s museum and classroom.” We will then ask the audience what seemed innovative about the design.
• Affirming all answers, we will highlight how the building reflects the principles of Universal Design (UD) and how its features support and enhance instruction based on Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles. We will then briefly review the history, research, and connections between UD and UDL to show why attention to these frameworks is critical when planning educational spaces.
• We will then share additional research about the connection between the physical environment and student achievement, including research on how student perception of the physical environment is also a key factor in learning.
• Using this research, we will establish the importance of designing educational spaces with significant input from students, teachers, and others who will be using the space -- and how making this a priority ensures equity.
• Next, we will share the greatest innovation in Ehrman Crest’s design: the public visioning sessions that the Museum and architects held prior to breaking ground. We also will show how this process is being replicated on projects throughout the Pittsburgh area, including testimonials from our partners, and how the process cultivates relationships and belonging within learning communities.
• We will close with strategies for obtaining buy-in for creating physical spaces based on UD principles and for applying these ideas to existing spaces with limited resources.

Mini-visioning Session (30 minutes)
Participants will work with their table group to envision “the ideal school.” To guide this process, they will have access to a color palette, Pintrest board or Padlet with different images, as well as to a physical collection of photographs and small objects. They will be instructed to select 1-2 objects that represent something that they would want to have in their ideal school: It can be a physical thing or feature, a mood or feeling, or just something that calls out to them when they think about their ideal school. They will then share their objects and ideas about the ideal school with each other. Together, the group will document their ideas on chart paper.

Gallery Walk & Personal Planning (15 minutes)
Participants will circulate to see other groups’ ideas. They will have the option to take their own notes or use a personal action planning sheet that we will provide to capture their thinking. The planning sheet will include guiding questions and a summary of the planning strategies shared during the presentation. There will be one for capital projects and one for classroom redesigns.

Closing (10 minutes)
We will ask participants to share their insights, questions, and/or part of their plan. In addition, we will provide a list of resources, including partners who are willing to be contacted with questions.

Supporting research

What is Universal Design? https://idea.ap.buffalo.edu/about/universal-design/

https://thisisud.com/

Edgerton E, McKechnie J. The relationship between student's perceptions of their school environment and academic achievement. Front Psychol. 2023 Feb 1. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9929545/

Fisher, D. & Frey, N. (2022). "Tending to Learning Environments." https://ascd.org/el/articles/tending-to-learning-evironments

Australia Children's Education and Care Quality Authority. (2018). Quality area 3: The environment and the "third teacher." National Quality Standard Information Sheet.

Horng, E. L. (2009). Teacher tradeoffs: Disentangling teachers' preferences for working conditions and student demographics. American Educational Research Journal, 46(3).

Mathews, B., & Soistmann, L. A. (2020). Encoding space: Shaping learning environments that unlock human potential. American Libraries.

National Center on Safe Supportive Learning Environments. (2022). Physical environment. https://safesupportivelearning.ed.gov/topic-research/environment/physical-environment

Uline, C. L., Wolsey, T. D., Tschannen-Moran, M., & Lin, C.-D. (2010). Improving the physical and social environment of school: A question of equity. Journal of School Leadership, 20(5).