Page 6 - School Planning & Management, June 2019

Healthy,
Safe Schools
K-12 school environments can cause illness and injuries. What schools must do to prevent these problems.
It may come as no surprise
that children as well as teenagers have ac- cidents and hurt themselves. Children and teenagers are careless, and parents must keep after them, reminding them to look around as they move and to avoid taking short cuts—or chances that might lead to an accident.
In school, however, there are no parents
to look after students. So, much of the job of preventing accidents is up to teachers and administrators, who, of course, must also look after themselves.
Facility design also has a hand in safe, healthy, and relatively accident-free schools, and school-design professionals give safety plenty of thought when remodeling schools, as well as designing new school.
The Indiana Department of Education has developed a comprehensive list of school de- sign features that promote safety. Available by way of the Internet, you can find it by googling “Seven Important Building Design Features to
Enhance School Safety and Security.” Consider, also, how school designers can
contribute to safety during the design stage of school construction. Both the Minneapolis, Minn.-based DLR Group and the Meridian, Idaho-based HFI-U (originally the Healthy Facilities Institute University) factor in safety and accident prevention while designing their school projects.
The DLR group combines research with experience in its efforts to limit accidents. “There is great research about this,” says Dina Sorensen, a senior associate with the firm. “We continually commission research to gain more and more understanding about how the artificial climates that we design contribute to processes that help stabilize the body, mind, and emotions.”
HFI-U has developed a handbook for facility remodeling that includes a focus on safety. Of course, HFI-U designers also focus on safety in new construction.
WEBSPM.COM
By Michael Fickes
6 SCHOOL PLANNING & MANAGEMENT / JUNE 2019
PHOTO © ANDREI KHOLMOV