Master Planning is the appropriate approach towards defining scope, budget/s and schedule/s to modernize and build facilities for the long-term view of any school campus.
While there are several ways to approach envisioning solutions for potentially emerging issues and needs, they usually involve a tangible and studious process characterized by analysis and calculated speculation, hereby drafted as the following checklist:
1. School Demographic Analysis: Determining whether a campus is growing or shrinking in terms of student enrollment is the first step. Bussing strategies and patterns, if applicable, are also analyzed.
2. DSA History: Determining the way the growth of the campus has been processed by DSA is crucial to find potential liabilities and roadblocks in expansion or modernization projects.
3. Funding Analysis: How to best match logistic information with funding programs to maximize project potential and feasibility.
4. School Curriculum: The direction that a school curriculum dictates often influences the master planning process, especially for facility-specific items (sports, science, tech, for example).
5. Environmental Data: The surface conditions, such as drainage, waste management, and maintenance and operations programs are deeply ingrained in the broad management of campus growth and must be thoroughly mastered.
6. Infrastructure: Locating the utility system of a campus is often referred to as a backbone. As such it must be optimized and must have a future built into it.
7. Site Planning: The matching of the school site plan with the class schedule often shows trends in how conditions are over and under utilized, and provides vital clues to determined and define expansion / modernization plans. Site circulation flow, car parking and access is a part of this as well.
8. Spatial Analysis: The study of qualities and scale of campus elements – height, use of materials, fenestration systems, open spaces, canopies and circulation pieces is inventoried.
9. Identity: The purposeful combination of material, building forms and color often add up to a school identity, which must always be addressed and enhanced.
10. Process Management: The mechanics of the process usually dictates master planning procedure and supports a communication based approach for successful client-architect relations.
11. Campus Security: Needless to say, the safety of students is primarily considered. From systems implementation to passive spatial management, all options are put on the table.
12. ADA, Structural Integrity and Fire Life Safety: Code compliance relative to Accessibility, Structural Integrity of Facilities and Fire Department, constitutes an essential chapter of master planning.
13. Sustainability: The impact of existing facilities on environment and resources is thoroughly catalogued for possible optimization.
While every master planning process is weighed differently, the above list should help in producing a complete and thorough study.
