As a student who has always lived in the Florida suburbs, all the schools I’ve been to have always been a campus with multiple buildings, coming with courtyards and sprawling outdoor pathways to take you to the next part of the day.
It was to my surprise and curiosity when I was exposed to the fact that not all schools were like mine. In densely populated urban areas, schools are built to be more compact, taking place mostly in one, or perhaps a few other buildings, without the wide-open space that schools in suburban and rural areas have.
While there is no best type of school campus, there are different benefits and drawbacks.
A smaller school campus with an emphasis on one or a few indoor buildings can be easier to secure and monitor, as it is easier to control access to a single building rather than a sprawling campus. Students and staff also don’t need to travel between multiple buildings on a single campus or between different campuses, saving time. In addition, a single building tends to be easier to secure and monitor compared to the sprawling outdoor campus.
On the other hand, a more expansive campus with more outdoor areas has space for larger athletic fields, playgrounds, and outdoor recreational areas for students. While students may have to travel to different buildings, the larger layout and space means that there may be less congestion in hallways. This type of campus also means that students are not indoors the whole school day, and exposure to nature and green spaces has been linked to benefits to psychological well-being, such as increased attention span and a better mood.
Ultimately, though, the decision to have a one building school campus versus an outdoor campus will depend on a variety of factors, especially budget and available space. Function and resources dictate the form of school facilities.
Schools in urban settings face challenges that their rural and suburban counterparts do not, some being small spaces, noise pollution, and traffic congestion. Urban schools are also often built in “found spaces”, such as highways, regional train lines or densely populated neighborhoods of commercial and residential use spaces, which architects need to plan around.
Rural schools and suburban schools also have their own difficulties, such as the isolation of rural schools leading to less attention and resources being given to them, or suburban schools witnessing shifting demographics.
While all schools share the common fundamental purpose of education, they also serve and are tailored to the communities around them, which alters their design and facility planning.
As more land has been developed, schools have faced challenges getting the space that they need, with the price and scarcity of land being a major issue for new schools. Articles as early as 2002 and 2004 have reported on schools struggling with land scarcity, detailing how a dwindling supply of land has been an issue across the United States.
This scarcity has caused school districts in cities such as Los Angeles and Chicago to buy land in the early 2000s in anticipation for future need. In addition, while the pandemic may have given students more funding, rising inflation and increased construction costs have also made it difficult for new schools to be constructed. Preemptively buying land, repurposing buildings and requiring land developers to set space aside for schools have all been ways school districts have attempted to get around these difficulties.
Schools have also resorted to co-location, especially in urban areas. Co-location means that a school shares its buildings with other schools, most commonly occurring with public schools sharing facilities with new charter schools that cannot establish facilities of their own.
Co-located schools allow other schools that need space to use up the extra space in another school; however, co-location has also caused distrust between school administrators, students, and teachers.
Not only has the cost of land been an issue, but also where that land is located. The issue of unequal school funding can also be attributed to land, as most schools are funded by a combination of local taxes and state funding, which results in property taxes being a key source of income for schools.
Schools built in poorer areas have less of a local tax base to rely on for revenue, while schools in weather areas have higher property values and are able to generate more money from local taxes. This difference between areas means that schools in low-income areas – who arguably need money more — receive lower local funding, while schools in wealthy areas receive greater funding. The poorest students go to the poorest schools. It’s critical to note that inequities in our school system predominantly hurt communities of color and the low-income the most, and that poor rural school districts are among the most struggling.
This reliance on property taxes results in schools attempting to cut costs where they can, shuttering music and art classes, having less school days in a week, and struggling to pay teachers and staff.
The discrepancies in land and property value hit school maintenance hard. The 2021 Report Card for America’s Infrastructure by the American Society of Civil Engineers rated public school infrastructure a D+. Underfunded schools cannot afford to upgrade their facilities, install air conditioning, and fix water leaks. Poor school infrastructure deteriorates teachers’ and students’ performances, and much of the issue is that underfunding makes it hard for schools with lower tax bases to secure improvements. Helping poorer schools afford improvements is even more critical as many buildings hit the 50-year mark, and the fallout from the pandemic has not helped.
While the location of your school may affect the type of campus you have, it affects much more than that. The placement of schools goes further than what your campus looks like, it also defines the challenges that they face and the revenue that they receive. When public school funding leaves the schools in low-income areas underfunded and students struggling, it’s our responsibility to demand a change.
Steps such as contacting your local government officials, your senators and representatives, and letting them know that you want education funding and infrastructure to be prioritized are good ones. You can also participate in protests and donate to organizations that advocate for a change in education, such as the National Education Association. Reach out into your local community and see what steps are feasible for you to take.
Afterall, no matter where you are, schools set up our future through educating the generations that will take over. It is up to us to define it and take action to give back to these places that serve their community so much.
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