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Click here to download the New Haven Public Schools Citywide School Construction Project Summary, Fourth Edition, City of New Haven, CT, by John DeStefano, Jr., Mayor, January, 2008.
Overview
The New Haven Public Schools are responsible for the education of 21,000 children, governed by an eightmember Board of Education. The Mayor serves on the Board and is the appointing authority of the other seven members. The district's services range from an innovative pre-K program to comprehensive programs at the elementary, middle, and high schools. Among its innovations, New Haven is known for its interdistrict magnet schools program, the largest in the State of Connecticut. One in every three students attends a school of choice, and the enrollment includes the largest suburban student enrollment of any district in the State. The dropout rate is the lowest of all Connecticut cities, and nearly 80% of graduates go on to college. New Haven also is known for its Social Development curriculum, which is visited and modeled by school districts all over the world and teaches young people social competencies that help them lead healthy, productive lives.
New Haven also operates the largest school construction program in the State, and the largest per capita in the country. Begun in 1995, the Citywide School Construction program has evolved into a national model for its massive scope, innovative financing and high degree of community involvement. A standard for construction has been adopted and guidelines defined to ensure consistency and continuity across diverse construction projects. These guidelines include familiarizing design firms with program requirements - what needs to be provided for teachers and students in order to teach the defined curriculum. Material guidelines relate to New Haven's design requirements and follow the Contract Specifications Institute (CSI) format. Standard specification guidelines were developed to ensure consistency in form and content between specifications of various design professionals. Energy efficiency is one of the most important priorities of the School Construction Program. These guidelines place particular emphasis on energy and indoor air quality performance and identify design tools and methodologies necessary to achieve an Energy Star Label for school buildings. In addition, the guidelines allow for pursuit of a LEED certification if it is desired and shown to be cost effective. All of the construction projects are overseen by a Commissioning Agent - an independent agent who reviews the methods and procedures used during design, construction, system startup, testing, and turnover for compliance with defined guidelines.
The results of this education infrastructure redesign is detailed school by school in this booklet. Each school has unique features that preserve the history and character in its neighborhood, expand, and create new schools to make room for programming needs now and into the future, and above all else, put students and learning first. Many schools incorporate facilities that benefit the neighborhood as well. In addition to the obvious desire for access to community recreation facilities, schools also offer dental and health clinics, parenting resources and guidance, and early childhood care and education.
Most designers have maximized the use of space and budgets by combining the functions of core spaces where possible. Moveable walls between cafeterias and music rooms can be opened to create an auditorium space, or, in one school, a proscenium stage was included in the side wall of the gymnasium. Seating can be arranged on the gym floor and the room turned into a performance space.
In all cases, designers have looked to future education programs not yet imagined and designed the new schools and additions to be extremely flexible. By strategically placing load bearing walls and beams, most new spaces could be completely gutted and reconfigured to meet the ever-changing education needs of students. Technology demands have been met, and future needs anticipated to the extent possible.
New Haven's newly designed education infrastructure - its diverse magnet school system, and its insistence that all schools meet the highest physical standards - provides students with a super highway to success.
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