Ending Disciplinary Architecture in America's Public Schools

ABSTRACT
The buildings children and teachers inhabit
directly affect what and how they learn.
And yet, physical structures of public
schools are often more reminiscent of a
prison than an environment cultivated
for learning. This supports the claim that
schools were intentionally constructed with
the tenants of disciplinary architecture at
the forefront; namely, how to maximize
efficiency and order through the use of
regimentation and authority.
Fortunately, innovative pedagogies have
come forward in recent decades that shift
away from the dominant, teacher-centered
hierarchy and towards a student-centered
model. However, school buildings
constructed over the last century prohibit
the implementation of these contemporary
learning theories. To accommodate modern
methods, the very architecture housing
these pedagogies must be reformed.
Adaptive reuse lies at the unique
intersection between the problem and
its solution. Construction costs of new
school builds are prohibitive, reaching
an astronomical average of $40M. Reurbanization
of cities and suburbanization
of rural areas has left little greenspace to
build large school campuses, forcing us to
reconsider how to use existing structures.
Through the optimistic act of adaptive
reuse, struggling communities, buildings,
and school districts can be redeemed and
regenerated. Adaptive reuse allows a total
abandonment of the prevailing archetype
of an academic school building by shifting
to a different building typology altogether.
exists. When schools resemble prisons,
students and learning suffer. As designers,
we have the moral obligation to abandon
the prevailing notion that discipline,
and its subsequent design principles,
reign supreme in public schools. Through
evidenced-based research, data, and
case studies, this thesis details forwardthinking
design criteria that will serve
as a functional toolkit of how to design
for a 21st century learning environment.
Utilizing this framework, the proposal puts
theory into practice by adapting a defunct
warehouse into a profoundly unique and
modernized school. Ultimately, it shows
how thoughtful school design can be a
catalyst for social change through one of
the most important equalizers: education.
The result is a liberating and dynamic
learning environment that reflects the
diversity of learners that make up the
21st century student body. Finally, this
thesis hopes to serve as a guidepost and
exemplar for designers, school leaders,
and educators to carry forward in their
own aspirational visions for the future of
education.
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My own experiences in a failed public
education system, and a subsequent sixyear
career in education prior to graduate
school, demonstrated that pedagogy can
only be as good as the space wherein it
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