|
OSFC
Guidelines
The Ohio School
Facilities Commission has developed guidelines to ensure all children attend
school in up-to-date buildings:
«Schools
must be reconstructed if the cost to renovate the structure exceeds 66
percent of the building’s value.
«Any
building that houses students must be included in the master plan. There
are no opt-out clauses.
«No
school can have fewer than 350 students.
«Square
footage in a school is based on number of students to ensure equity.
«Elementary
classrooms are to be 900 square feet and designed for no more than 25
students. |
|
A Partnership with the State
 CPS is among the first urban districts in Ohio to address building
concerns in conjunction with the Ohio School Facilities Commission (OSFC), the agency directing a statewide
campaign to upgrade all Ohio school buildings to the same standard and
quality. It’s a massive effort, spending an average of $1.7 million a day
on school-building improvements and opening a new school nearly every week
across the state.
Cincinnati Public Schools’ students will move into upgraded
buildings sooner than originally expected, thanks to pressure from CPS
officials to convince the Ohio legislature to move urban school districts
higher on the list. The original timetable put CPS into 2010 before
state assistance would have been available.
Cincinnati Public also is ahead of other urban districts by having
hired a Construction Manager and a Master Architect to work in conjunction
with CPS and OSFC officials to formulate the Facilities Master Plan.
"We consider CPS a model
for what OSFC wants to happen in city school districts," said Colleen Rezabeck
with
OSFC.
Forming the basis of the Facilities Master Plan is OSFC’s
school-by-school assessment, which determines the cost to bring each
building up to OSFC standards. If the cost to renovate amounts to more
than 66 percent of the cost to rebuild, the state generally will
contribute money only toward new construction.
According to the OSFC assessments, 15 of the district’s schools came
in under the 66 percent cutoff. That means the state recommends replacing
80 percent of some CPS’ buildings. District officials have applied for
waivers from the rebuild/renovate rule based on compelling causes, such as
a building’s historical significance or where facilities are shared with
another agency.
|
 Assessment Basics
Rebuild or Renovate
The assessments reached an ironic conclusion for many CPS buildings:
Older buildings often were rated better than relatively newer buildings,
many of which received recommendations to be torn down and rebuilt.
The reason: Construction methods and materials in the 1950s produced
buildings that don’t lend themselves to renovation as well as buildings
erected decades earlier.
"One hundred years ago, buildings were built to last 200 years. In
the ’50s, buildings were built to last 50 years. So these 1950s’ buildings
have reached their lifespan," said Russ Alford, project manager with
Turner/DAG/TYS, the district’s construction manager for the Facilities
Master Plan. "They are extremely expensive, if not impossible, to renovate
to today’s standards."
Excess Space Costly
District and state officials also want to eliminate costly extra
classroom space. The district’s enrollment
has dropped by about 15 percent over past years, and, according
to a study of birth rates and population-migration patterns, it will
continue to decline more over the next decade.
That leaves CPS with about 1.8 million square feet of expensive,
unnecessary space.
Educational Standards
New construction creates the opportunity to build schools
specifically designed for teachers working in teams, the educational model
CPS has adopted as best for ensuring success of its standards-based
curriculum. The Facilities Master Plan recommends designing schools with
classrooms clustered in groups — unlike the century-old model of classrooms
lined up along a central hallway.
The standards include stipulations such as all
schools will be air-conditioned and every classroom wired for
computers. There is flexibility to meet a district’s specific needs;
for example, the OSFC agreed to allow CPS to build a new school on 4.5
acres instead of the 13 acres it requires in more rural districts.
The OSFC Design Manual, a six-inch thick binder,
gives standards for everything that will go into new or renovated
school buildings — from furniture to windows to the size of the
classrooms and the equipment each classroom contains. The manual ranks
items as good, better and best, giving districts the option to pick
from the high-, middle- or low-cost range.
"We don’t site a brand. We don’t pick colors,"
said Alan Foust with OSFC. "Items make it into the manual based on a 40-year,
life-cycle cost analysis."
The standards were developed with assistance from
superintendents, teachers, architects and construction managers
locally and from around the nation, Foust said. |
|
