Building a new school Update 1



Kia ora e te whanau,

For those of you, who may not aware, our Wēteri Kura (Wesley Primary) will go through some changes in the coming year. We are going to build a new school on our backfield and share some of the latest news/designs. The final design has not been confirmed but I thought I would document some of the journey so far and present some of the initial concepts with whanau, staff, and students so that we may review and reflect together in the coming months. Our main goal is to develop an Innovative Learning Environment (new Wēteri school) for our staff and students to be empowered to learn and become respectful and responsible citizens of Aotearoa. 

RTA studios - are the architects who have supported our design team to come up with the following Preliminary Design. They have been amazing to work with so far and have provided so many opportunities to share and consult on this initial plan. This group of architects are such awesome professionals who have bought a vision to life through beautiful drawings, and for this, I am so thankful to the Ministry of Education and RTA for working in partnership with our school. 


The process will eventually lead to a design being sent to the Design Review Panel (DRP). before we can have an actual plan to build a school. As a new principal, this kaupapa is both exciting and brings a huge learning curve as it is not something I trained in or can do on my own. So firstly I would like to thank Shelley our DP, Sione our Board Chair and Moira our staff rep for supporting me to help design a new school.  We are all trying our best to ensure that we can take all of our staff, Board of Trustees and community on the journey to deliver an awesome new school that we all deserve.  I am also very thankful for the kaupapa that Brenda Martin (our previous Principal) started a few years ago with the Wēteri new build and this provided a strong foundation for the work we are currently doing through an education brief and conceptual preliminary design process. 

 My favourite part of the design process so far of the new build of our school is thinking and challenging my own thinking on how the physical spaces will be designed to better serve the needs of our students, staff and community. Secondly, I believe that by facing our school on O'Donnell Ave, we will become very inviting to whanau as the entrance will have a dedicated driveway and entrance to the office. 

The concepts in our design were created by RTA who were been inspired by our Te Auaunga Awa, Owairaka Maunga and the Education Design Brief created by Brenda Martin (former Principal) and the staff. Features of the Awa include the use of Hari-keke in the sound deflection surfaces on the ceiling and ortex (display surfaces) stream in the classroom spaces. 



I also like the use of natural wood grain and neutral stone-like surfaces create the feeling of a connection to ngahere or the forest for our staff and learners. See the concept on the left, of what the new outdoor learning space could look like which has a tree planted in the middle which could grow between two floors. These caves, watering holes and campfire like features provide many different ways of learning and collaborating. 


Although the actual layout of the classrooms seem massive at this stage (which is meant to fit 100 students), we are able to have two maker spaces/kitchens, two break out spaces which can fit 10 students each) and several larger teaching spaces which can fit up to 50 students. The following diagram shows what a potential layout could look like - keep in mind that the desks and chairs are only conceptual to gauge whether we could actually fit in 100 students. The teachers and students will be involved in designing how their classrooms will look in the coming months. 


I would love to encourage the school community, staff, students, and school partners to complete the following survey to help us gather ideas and feedback - via this google form. I am hoping to keep our whanau, students, and staff updated as much as possible but if you want to come in to school and see the plan in person, we will be putting this up in our foyer as ongoing display. Keep in mind that the blocks on the following plan are pretty much set up and may not change that much. 



Nga mihi nui

Lou Reddy

Tumuaki - Principal

l.reddy@wesleyprimary.school.nz

 

Comments

  1. Phil @ Ako HikoNovember 3, 2020 at 1:49 PM

    Kia ora Lou. I enjoyed reading your blog post. I love the idea of caves, watering holes and campfires and can't wait to see them in action. On our study tour we saw some awesome green screen rooms. Maybe one of your breakout spaces could be used for that?

    ReplyDelete
  2. SamanthaNovember 4, 2020 at 11:34 AM

    Kia Ora Lou,
    As a member of Weteri, we are so thankful for the effort you have put in to the thinking around these innovative spaces. We look forward to being involved in designing how the classrooms will look. I agree with Phil that a green screen or recording room would be an awesome addition. Great read, thanks for posting.

    ReplyDelete

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