Researching

Part 1

Students, their parents, teachers and school stuff will form a school community with the help of a team of architects, designers and artists and find out what they want to change to make their school a better place.

How It Works

Research Quest for Students

A series of 7 interdisciplinary game driven workshops during which students will explore the school space in all its diversity, identify the «bad and good» spots, bring to light the opinions of the whole school community and make their own proposals of what needs to be changed.

Experts' Research

An open call for experts from different fields (sociologists, product designers, acousticians, lighting designers ...) will be announced. Selected experts will explore the school space and identify problems in various areas. This will give a professional point of view to the school space.

Research Quest for Teachers and School Staff

The quest will show teachers and school staff opinion on the school space.

Public Events for All

A series of 5 public events to show the importance of the school, to form a school community and make all voices heard: students, parents, teachers, administration, canteen, maintenance, cleaning and medical personnel. Research Exhibition will be a final event where the outcomes of research by students, experts teachers and school staff will be presented.

Design Assignment

Design assignment will be developed on the basis of research findings. It will specify what has to be designed. It could be a canopy, playground, street art mural ... Design assignment will be approved by the school administration and included in the curriculum of the next stage.

RESEARCH QUEST
FOR STUDENTS

We will explore together with all school community from children to their parents and stuff space of a school as a complex synthetic phenomenon and multi-layers subject of study. Through meetings with students, team work, quests for exploring school space we will understand problems of school in their diversity, from lightning to sounds, from social to ecological aspect.
During research stage students will be the main participants of process accompanied on some phases by interdisciplinary team of professionals which will expand the horizons of perception of the school.
Satellite events will expand the scale of a project from research within space to study school in context of city history, time and the role of people in shaping the image of the school.

Find assigned spaces. Photo, map and describe spaces according to given instructions.

Presentation of the project. Explaining the goals and objectives of the project and why it is important.

Issuance of tasks (separate) for children and adults (teachers, parents) for independent study/research of the school. By this stage, develop special research brochures with games, quests, tasks, etc. for the interactivity of the process. Designation of restrictions (time, opportunity to work in a group), the outcome of the study (future final public presentation). Duration of research – one week.

Search for specialists from various fields to participate in the study. Find experts from areas such as sociologists, product designers, acousticians, lighting designers, etc. through an open call on social networks. Present the project to them and explain their role.

Study of the school space by experts (program organizers) from various disciplines. Explore the space of the school to identify problems in various areas.

Organize a meeting-discussion for large audience with school graduates: how do they remember the school, what it was like, how it feels, etc. Lecture for children and adults. The aim is to give an understanding and a sense of the depth and importance of the school, not only as architecture, but as a place with history and its past. Make a video fixation for project archive.

Organize an exhibition at the school open space with archival photographs, texts, drawings, graduates notebooks, etc. related to the history of the school. Explore the history of the place: an archive of photographs of the school. With it to show the phenomena of school in context of time with its "depth"; to show that for the project both the view of the future generation and the historical layer of the school's past are important; to show school community the school as an evidence of time flow.

Meeting with the children to check their research and prepare for the public presentation. Invite psychologist to help with. Presentation training, designation of the framework and format of the future presentation. Record the results (scanning/ photography).

Presentation of the research results by children to adults and vice versa. Invite large audience. Q&A.
We will show to public the results of the children's and adult's work within the framework of the project; initiate a discussion between children and adults on research issues; give children the opportunity to express their thoughts and involve children in an unusual "adult" role of analysts for them, giving them the opportunity to ask adults questions
Video fixation of process.

Organize an exhibition of the results of children's research at the school: photo survey, comics, results of sociological surveys, photos of process of the workshops. It will unite the school community around the current project and will underline the questions and problems of research. The exhibition in open space will keep the entire school community informed about the ongoing stages of the project. Make public opening during research presentation. Involve high school student in process of preparing.

The group of the project collects and analyzes all received data (from children, adults) to understand the general and popular needs of the school community and identify the most pressing and actual problems.

With received and analyzed results of research team of project developing the assignment for next step.

Getting to know one another, creating a safe environment, negotiating the rules of communication, build a team. Introducing the project, its goals and stages. Explaining what research is and how it works.

Find assigned atmospheres blindfolded, only using sound, smell and touch. Map the atmospheres.

Find assigned spaces. Photo, map and describe spaces according to given instructions.

Explore the school through people. Prepare questionnaires for social survey, assign survey groups, interview people. The results of the opinion poll will be presented at the exhibition and used in the design assignment.