Florida Atlantic University A.D. Henderson University School Addition

1. 2011 Exhibition of School Planning and Architecture Florida Atlantic University A.D. Henderson University School Addition Boca Raton, Florida New Construction I Middle School/Jr. High Zyscovich Architects

2. Florida Atlantic University A.D. Henderson University School Addition

3. Transitional Learning: Creating Self-directed Learners in the New Addition Traditional Learning: Teacher-directed Classrooms for Young Students Future Learning: Self-directed Learning on the FAU Campus Traditional, Transitional & Future Learning | COMMUNITY ENVIRONMENT The A.D. Henderson University School (ADHUS) is a public laboratory school associated with the Florida Atlantic University (FAU) College of Education and situated on FAU’s main campus. The school has a three-fold mission of (1) being a demonstration site for teacher education; (2) developing curricula; and (3) conducting research. The PK-12 school’s learning environment begins in a traditional teacher-centered classroom setting in the lower grades and ultimately transitions students to being self-directed, high performing, autonomous students taking classes on the University campus in grades 10-12. The students’ academic transformation takes place in this new addition, which primarily houses the upper middle school grades (6-9) but also provides space for students in grades 10-12. The objective of the project was to create multiple flexible learning environments for everything from traditional teacher-centered learning to self-directed, student-centered learning in a single, flexible facility.

4. ADHUS Site Plan I COMMUNITY ENVIRONMENT In keeping with Zyscovich’s philosophy that “Learning Happens Everywhere,” both the site plan and architectural design emphasize flexibility and fluidity. The site plan re-forms the campus, redefining its center as a space for circulation, gathering, assembly and teaching. This area allows for the mixing of various grade levels and facilitates the sharing of experiences among students of varying ages and interests.

5. Main Entry & School Assembly Amphitheater | COMMUNITY ENVIRONMENT Instructional areas are located in close proximity to all of the school’s supporting program areas. The existing school did not have a gathering space large enough to hold the student body, therefore the firm designed an extension to the Music in Motion Studio that connects to the outdoors via a bermed amphitheater and performance space/stage at the main entry, sized to hold the entire student population.

6. Research & Development: Administration | COMMUNITY ENVIRONMENT The Administration area doubles as an Educational Research & Development Lab. Like the school, this space is highly flexible, allowing for endless reconfiguration of furniture to accommodate parent-teacher conferences, staff meetings, and group collaboration amongst College of Education staff, school staff, student teachers and researchers. The curriculums and teaching modalities invented here are tested in the facility.

7. Dry-Erase board locker surfaces allow for the exchange of ideas everywhere. The Oasis | COMMUNITY/LEARNING ENVIRONMENT The design specifically allows for engagement with the University community as well as dedicated areas within the school for upper level students to return to for guidance, study, collaboration, research, and socialization amongst their peers. The upper level students also share their experiences with the younger ADHUS community, providing guidance and support.

8. Music in Motion Stage Views from Studio to Outdoors Music in Motion Amphitheater Music in Motion Studio | LEARNING ENVIRONMENT The flexibility of the building’s interior overflows into the site. The Music in Motion Studio is not only visually connected to the exterior through fenestration providing daylighting and views, but also extends outward with the main entry to the facility doubling as a stage for the outdoor bermed amphitheater.

9. Discovery Lab & Patio | LEARNING ENVIRONMENT The Discovery Lab is a highly flexible space designed to accommodate all manner of project-based learning and collaboration in a variety of subjects, including science and art. The Lab extends to the outdoors via the Discovery Patio, which has planned spaces for student projects in and around the building. Exposed building systems, resource monitoring , and visible mechanical rooms also inspire “What’s that?” questions.

10. Traditional Lecture Configuration Small Group Configuration Traditional (but Flexible) Lecture | LEARNING ENVIRONMENT All furniture throughout the facility is on casters, allowing for endless configurations to adapt to the content of the curriculums and modalities being tested and each student’s learning style. Technology is integrated throughout all classrooms, commons and collaborative areas to promote on-demand, serendipitous 21st century learning opportunities. Each classroom and the collaboration spaces include sound reinforcement systems, computer projection and smart boards, and the traditional lecture rooms double as a Distance Learning Lab.

11. Red lines indicate operable partitions The Learning Studios | LEARNING ENVIRONMENT Surrounding the traditional “box” classrooms and filling the School Commons (corridor) are numerous flexible studio spaces designed to shrink or grow according to the teaching modality being implemented. These include a Harkness Table Studio, a Debate Studio, Independent Learning Studios and Seminar Studios, as well as “Innovation Hubs” in the corridor. Operable partitions and doors connect or close off spaces.

12. School Commons | LEARNING ENVIRONMENT Important learning occurs outside classrooms in spaces designed to encourage student interaction with peers, staff, faculty and parents. The studios and classrooms are arranged around a central collaboration corridor which is designed not as a circulation space with added furniture, but as a meaningful programmatic element. The collaboration spaces and studios are flexible so that the students can make them “their own.”

13. Future Student Project Areas with Rainwater Cisterns for Irrigation The Site as a Teaching Tool | PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT A.D. Henderson’s commitment to learning innovation and the environment is equally demonstrated in its charge to design the school in accordance with requirements for LEED Gold Certification. In addition to spatial innovation, Zyscovich applied equal inventiveness to the use of materials and their application. Glass rather than concrete walls and doors that open out onto patios and grounds allow for views of student activity from administrative quarters as well as for increased space, light, and ventilation. Innovative classroom-extending spaces were created in breezeways, porches and outdoor courtyards to enlarge the effective educational footprint of the facility. A landscape buffer and nature trail at the east side of the campus have been maintained along with areas for student projects focusing on the cultivation of existing native species.

14. Exposed Ductwork & Mechanical Systems Visible Mechanical & Data Rooms Signage Explaining LEED Features The Building as a Teaching Tool | PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT The firm strove to recapture those programmatic fractions of space normally occupied by walls and circulation by applying dry-erase marker film on the outside of student lockers, making them instructional surfaces and the corridors learning galleries. The building itself was designed in a way that makes many of its environmental benefits obvious to the students and teachers, i.e. the buildings themselves teach via the use of exposed mechanicals, rain water cisterns, and a system of data collection on solar power and air cooling and distribution. Mechanical and Data Rooms are accessible to students in order to make visible the facility’s technological backbone. The school employs the building and its systems as daily 3-D learning opportunities to foster student questions and promote data analysis of such areas as energy production, water harvesting and environmental conditions in real time. Acoustic materials divide the various teaching spaces.

15. Sustainable Systems & Materials | PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT The design team evaluated various materials, electrical, and mechanical systems, exploring the newest technologies, and applied the best concepts to this facility. Since energy use and sustainability were an important part of the school’s vision, building energy modeling was utilized as an assessment tool, and meetings with maintenance staff were conducted to ensure the future maintainability of all building systems.

16. Learning Studio with Traditional Furniture Arrangement | PLANNING PROCESS In addition to analyzing post-occupancy evaluations of other facilities, the planning process engaged numerous stakeholders, from the superintendent, school administrators, and senior School and College staff to architects, engineers, building maintenance personnel and the FAU facilities management department A major part of the planning revolved around the programming of the facility, including a review of past, present and potential future teaching modalities and pedagogies. The firm targeted and provided recommendations on how the flexible spaces, furniture, technology and systems would ultimately be utilized in the facility to ensure both the 21st century educational and research missions of the school were met.

17. Floor Plan

18. Exhibition of School Planning and Architecture 2010 Project Data

19. Exhibition of School Planning and Architecture 2010 Project Details