Page 18 - College Planning & Management, May 2018

SPACES FOR LEARNING
adding that the OhioLINK information network enables the reduction of stack space.
Kent State has sequentially added various types of shared spaces floor by floor in the 12-story library building. Some of those areas are glass- walled, while others take the forms of booths
and lounges—and all are fully wired and WiFi- enabled. Those spaces consist of small group study rooms on two floors; a presentation practice room; and an entire dedicated floor, dubbed the “Fab Fourth,” with soft seating and Media:scape Pods, according to the university. Other collaborative spaces have been created in recent years within Kent State’s student center and Taylor Hall, home of the campus’ communication studies program.
Elsewhere, a creative interior redesign approach has renovated the library of the Moore College of Art & Design in Philadelphia, says William Hill, Moore’s senior vice president of Finance and Administra- tion. An effort led by Karen Daroff Design Inc.— Daroff is a Moore alumna—makes the most of the library space, with areas for groups, a studio, and areas for student and faculty collaboration. Move- able furniture and shelving systems create options for teamwork, shared study, and events that have reactivated the library, making it into “the center of academic life of the school,” Hill adds.
{In various cases, a sleek, { leading-edge ambience
is evident, as is the fundamental concept
of designing campus spaces that match how many students prefer to learn today.
Future-Focused
In Gladstone, MO, the Northland Innovation Center (NIC), an in- novative, urban, vertical education center, is a collaborative and modern campus for future generations. Designed by Hoefer Wysocki of Leawood, KS, the NIC is designed to advance learning for students from kinder- garten through post-secondary education under one roof.
“Campus ecosystems are increasingly shaped by the confluence of business and academic activities,” explains Richard Miller, FAIA, Hoefer Wysocki’s national higher education practice leader. “As evidenced by the maker movement, a more self-directed, interactive approach to learning both reinvents vocational pathways for future workforce talent pools, and strengthens ties between education and the workplace. A new emphasis on nontraditional, experiential settings better reflects the world where students are headed as high-quality skill sets trump credentials.”
The design team took this vision and ideology to heart as it set out to create an inspiring and engaging space. The vertically oriented urban campus sets a new stage for all levels of education for the real world.
NIC’s dynamic learning environment is flexible and multimodal. Collaboration is a driving theme of the space planning—inside and out. Walls are sparingly used; interior collaboration spaces are created on the fly with furniture arrangements and movable panels to minimize noise and visual distractions. A full kitchen and cafeteria, multi-purpose
FROM START TO FINISH. Embodying educa- tion as the infrastructure of the future, the five-story Northland Innovation Center in Gladstone, MO, creates an innovative learning environment for future generations. The design concept is focused on creating an urban, vertical campus for students in kindergarten through post-secondary programs. The vertical campus creates a framework to generate new ideas with minimally partitioned spaces to foster applied learning that closely resembles today’s high-tech workplace.
18 COLLEGE PLANNING & MANAGEMENT / MAY 2018
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PHOTOS COURTESY OF HOEFER WYSOCKI
RENDERING COURTESY OF DAROFF DESIGN