Open Architecture Network

We are inviting you, the designer, to work with students and teachers to design the classroom of the future for a school of your choosing. Your design should address the unique challenges your school faces in trying to provide innovative, safe and sustainable learning spaces.

Find out what teachers and students in your school need to make their learning environments more effective. Does the classroom inspire learning? Is it overcrowded? Noisy? Does the classroom have natural daylight? What obstacles prevent schools from upgrading classrooms or building additional classroom space? Show us how your design would address the obstacles to providing inspiring learning spaces in your school.

You may partner with any primary or secondary school. (Please note: Classroom designs for universities and other training academies are not eligible to win.) The school you choose to partner with can be a local school or one in another region or country. Student participation is strongly encouraged and will be considered by the jury. The competition focuses on the design of a single, replicable adaptable classroom. Design teams are not asked to submit designs for an entire school.

We've created teacher resources, including a design curriculum and web casts to help you engage and inspire students. Who knows, one of the students you work with could be the next Calatrava. And, you could be the one who inspired them to become a design professional.

Partner | Rumi Schools of Excellence, Orient Global’s chain of low-cost private schools

Orient Global is a Singapore-based private investment group founded by New Zealand-born entrepreneur Richard F. Chandler. In 2007, Orient Global announced a USD 100 million commitment to education, with a mission to combat global illiteracy by enhancing the quality and availability of education for low income communities in developing countries.

Rumi Schools of Excellence is Orient Global's chain of low-cost private schools in India, which aims to extend access and improve educational quality through affordable private schooling. Students in Rumi Schools of Excellence pay fees of just USD 3-7 per month. In India, there are hundreds of thousands of existing low-cost private schools spread across the country, serving low-income communities by providing an education at an affordable cost. Rumi Schools of Excellence represents the first large-scale private investment in improving the education delivered by this informal sector. There are plans to add hundreds of schools to the Rumi Schools of Excellence network in the coming years.

Rumi Schools of Excellence are situated in high-density urban areas in low-income communities. Growing enrollment demand has led to the need to turn existing buildings into schools, adding classrooms and other necessary infrastructure. Due to budget limitations, space constraints and unsafe building practices the vast majority of these classrooms suffer from poor ventilation, limited lighting, with little or no temperature regulation. This also leads to overcrowding and uncomfortable seating and working arrangements for students and teachers respectively. The poor quality of these learning environments results in reduced student attentiveness, a loss of creativity in learning and a higher rate of teacher absenteeism.

The challenge is to develop innovative design solutions to upgrade and expand existing Rumi Schools of Excellence classroom environments in high-density urban settings in India

Partners | Modular Building Institute | Blazer Industries
School districts have many constraints when planning for new classroom space. They must respond to shifting populations and overcrowded schools, aging infrastructure, limited capital funding and ever shrinking budgets. Relocatable classrooms are often chosen by administrators as an expedient solution to many of these complex issues. In recent years, manufacturers and organizations such as the Collaboration for High Performance Schools have worked together to improve the quality of relocatable classrooms. Many manufacturers are now capable of producing cutting-edge modular classrooms.

Partner | Building Tomorrow
Building Tomorrow is an international social-profit organization encouraging philanthropy among young people by raising awareness and funds to build and support educational infrastructure projects for vulnerable children in sub-Saharan Africa. By opening doors to new, accessible neighborhood classrooms, Building Tomorrow can help reduce illiteracy among children, reduce the dropout rate and ensure a brighter future for thousands of children.

In Uganda, 57 percent of children finish primary school and 18 percent have the chance to attend secondary school. And over 1 million children are not enrolled in primary school and, of those, 70 percent are never expected to.

The challenge is to develop innovative design solutions for classrooms in remote/rural communities in Uganda, with little or no existing access to educational facilities.