Case studies involving the greening of schoolyards in three large cities demonstrate how the concept of resilience can be practically understood as a system-strengthening approach. Resilience generally refers to “the capacity of a system under stress to continue functioning through adaptation and transformation.” The cities involved are Amsterdam, Chicago, and Paris. All three of these cities are in the process of expanding their green schoolyards with an explicit objective to benefit the students, the local communities, and the city overall. They are thus focusing on building resilience at three system scales: project (school), community, and city.
One of the goals of the green schoolyard initiative in Paris is to establish “cool refuges” throughout the city. Paris, like many other cities, is vulnerable to heat waves during extreme weather events. Green schoolyards can mitigate the heat island effect. Other goals of the Paris green schoolyard initiative include improving air quality, increasing urban agriculture, and strengthening the social fabric of local communities. The focus of Chicago's program -- in addition to preventing floods through stormwater management – is to improve students' outdoor school-time experience and to increase access to recreation and park space for the wider community. Amsterdam's program focuses on the integration of several city-wide goals: stimulating active play, adding 25% green per schoolyard, contributing to the rainwater absorption program, and increasing nature/outdoor education, citizen participation and sustainability.
In addition to describing specific aspects of the schoolyard initiatives in each of the three cities, this case study report also presents an analysis based on the nine-box resilience frame. This frame was developed by the Resilience Action Initiative to “enable consideration of resilience as a systemic property, in multisector partnerships of cities, civil society, and companies.” The nine-box resilience frame consists of nine elements organized around three themes or lenses. The three lenses are structural resilience, integrative resilience, and transformative resilience. Any system under consideration can be viewed through each of these lenses. This process makes it possible to assess the resilience dynamics of a given system or scale.
The purpose of applying the nine-box resilience frame in exploring these case studies was not to comment on the design or success of the cases involved but to demonstrate how resilience concepts and a systems approach can be used to improve projects, programs, and policies at any scale. Applying the nine-box-frame allowed the researchers to demonstrate the multi-beneficial impacts of greening schoolyards in multiple areas, including (a) community engagement and social cohesion, (b) mitigating and adapting to climate change, and (c) improving health and wellbeing.
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