Study identifies impactful and affordable biophilic design strategies for existing K-12 schoolsThe physical school environment is an important influence on children’s development and wellbeing. Poorly funded school facilities can negatively impact health and learning. Biophilic design, an emerging field that aims to connect people and nature in built environments, offers an approach to improving school environments to benefit students and educators. To make biophilic design more feasible for schools, this study aimed to develop a toolkit of biophilic retrofit strategies for K-12 schools and investigate stakeholder perceptions of the strategies’ benefits and affordability.
The first phase of the study involved review of existing biophilic frameworks to identify implementable design strategies in K-12 schools. The resulting 42 strategies were organized into a taxonomy of seven categories. Researchers then created a “Biophilic Toolkit,” a card set that included an illustration of each strategy in practice and a description of the strategy and its benefit to students and teachers. The second phase focused on a user perception study to evaluate the perceived impact and affordability of each strategy. A survey was developed to assess each strategy using a ranking system, which ranged from +4 (“High Impact and Affordable”) to −4 (“Low Impact and Expensive”). Teachers, school administrators, parents, and school designers at four K-12 schools in a city in Pennsylvania, U.S. were provided with the toolkit and survey. Additionally, an electronic version of the toolkit and survey resulted in responses submitted from 13 different states. A total of 74 completed surveys were received, mostly from teachers/school administrators (78%).
Stakeholder perceptions of biophilic elements were positive and each strategy was perceived to have beneficial impacts on student and faculty outcomes by at least 77% of participants. Many strategies were identified to have significant impact and affordability, including educational nature content, animals in the classroom, plants in the classroom, sunlight and circadian daylight, fragrant flowers/herbs, natural ventilation, outdoor water features, sounds of nature from outside, classroom opening to the outdoors or to an outdoor play space, outdoor landscape for teaching, partial refuge (shelter), wooden furniture, and outdoor eating spaces. Additionally, several strategies within the ‘View’ category were identified to have a significant perceived impact on impact and affordability which highlights the importance of windows in the classroom. These include clear glass windows, washed windows, landscape views from the classroom, views of wildlife habitats, and shading devices enabling views. Overall, based on the combined level of positive impact and affordability, the researchers suggest prioritization be given to sunlight, educational nature content, circadian daylight, fragrant flowers and herbs, outdoor eating spaces, clear glass/washed windows, and plants in the classroom.
The study suggests that there are “numerous affordable retrofit strategies to introduce biophilic design into existing schools.” The toolkit and findings from the study can guide schools aiming to prioritize low-cost, impactful biophilic strategies to enhance learning as well as student and educator wellbeing. The researchers call for stakeholders’ involvement in the design process to ensure the selection of strategies that best reflect the goals of the school.
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