NMS Student Group Designs School Of The Future For Competition

By Eliza Hallabeck

A school of the future, according to Newtown Middle School eighth graders Claire Boyle, Sophie Kennen, Julia Preszler, and Haley Williams, would include a roof garden, natural lighting in all classrooms, and a community-minded design.

As their eighth grade science project the four girls teamed up in September to work on an entry for the School of the Future Design Competition, overseen by the Council of Educational Facility Planners International. The competition is held at the school, state, regional, and national levels.

Last year, a team from Newtown Middle School — made up of then-eighth grade students Baxter Hankin, Arnav Singh, Lyle Lee, and Sean Lee — took second place in the national level of the competition. It was also Baxter, Julia said this week, who helped this year’s team prepare for what they would face at the competition.

This school year the four girls earned a place at the regional level of the competition after first competing at the state level earlier this month.

“It was exciting, because we get the chance to move on to another level of the competition,” said Julia this week.

The jury to judge the regional level of the competition will convene in late February, according to the middle school students, and the girls expect to find out whether they will be moving on to the national level of the competition soon after that.

“It is a big accomplishment for us,” said Sophie, “and we worked really hard.”

Teams are allowed to alter their projects after hearing feedback from judges at the different levels of the competition. If the girls are entered into the national level of the School of the Future Design Competition, they will head to Washington, D.C., in April. Unlike the regional level of the competition, teams will attend the national level of judging.

Learning that their team had gone on to the regional level of the competition was exciting, said Haley. The girls faced only one other team at the state level of the competition and were never allowed to see the other team’s submitted project, according to the girls.

As designed by the group, their school of the future would have two floors and would accommodate 700 middle school students in grades six through eight.

“We would have skylights on the roof, and a roof garden in the front,” said Julia.

All classrooms in the school would have access to natural lighting and are organized by subject. While the school is designed as a square with the center an open space, the second floor of the school would have bridges connected different sections of the building to help ease transitions between classes, the girls said.

“We have a wide range of electives to provide students a look at future careers,” said Claire.

The school would also have solar panels and skylights.

While the girls only designed the middle school, they also outlined a campus on which all of the schools in the district could be located. The cafeteria and gymnasiums for the schools would be located in one central building for all of the school district’s schools to share.

“The schools can share resources,” Claire explained.

Other resources that would be included on the campus are a barn, orchard, and community gardens.

To complete their project, the group said they started with brainstorming activities, then began researching the topic. After consulting two architects, Maura Newell Juan of seventy2architects in Danbury and Jonathan Kost of Jonathan Kost Architecture of Sandy Hook, the girls also compiled research.

“We have pages of [research],” said Sophie.

Heading into the regional level of the competition the girls agreed they are hopeful their Kennedy Middle School, named after President John F. Kennedy, will advance further.