Post-war Sustainability-Driven School Buildings: A Review of the Literature

The Safe Schools Declaration of 2015 is an inter-governmental political agreement signed by several countries designed to protect the schooling of the school-aged population during armed conflicts.Yet,in countries where civil war erupted,schools were demolished.Several school-aged children were either forcibly recruited by governments or coerced by rebel groups to serve in armed fights.As a result,several children were deprived of their education and have remained suffering from deep psychological scars.The central question of the study is:What kind of sustainability-driven school buildings can be initiated in countries that are now enduring peace so that the learning environments are more comfortable and improve the well-being of the war-impacted children and school employees?After reviewing the literature,a strategic conceptual framework that incorporated the synergistic relationship between economic,social,and environmental aspects of sustainability was initiated to map out sustainable school buildings.In short,the conceptual framework proposed to construct school buildings in some of the war-affected developing countries includes assembling cost-efficiency and eco-effectiveness inputs,using renewable energy sources powered by natural sunlight,collecting rainwater in mud cisterns,reducing emissions of carbon oxides,and empowering the local community to be the main actors to design sustainable buildings during the preconstruction,construction,and post-construction stages to serve as learning spaces for the war-affected occupants and their neighborhoods.

Seismic design analysis of the country masonry school buildings in the meizoseismal area

Several reinforcing schemes are illustrated that are based on the loading characteristics of typical country masonry school buildings with sparsely spaced transversal walls and large depth. From the seismic damage observed following the Wenchuan Earthquake, the effects of reinforcing schemes, tie-columns and tie-beams on the seismic resistance of masonry buildings are analyzed. The concept of improving the ductility of these types of buildings is presented. Finally, some suggestions are proposed for the design of masonry buildings with sparsely spaced transversal walls and large depth.

Energy Consumption, Thermal Performance and Thermal Comfort in Public School Buildings in Jordan

Good learning outputs in schools require an acceptable physical environment inside schools. Whatever the climatic context that surrounds any school buildings, energy flows of different types should be provided. Concerns may include thermal environment, luminous environment and acoustics environment. Types of energy used are an important variable that contributes to thermal comfort. Physical structure of the school building is another factor to be taken into consideration. This article established a relationship between thermal comfort inside schools and types of energy flows which have been consumed to maintain the level of comfort required, controlled by the building fabric and consequent economic factors that affect energy consumption of school buildings. Different approaches were applied in order to achieve the research objectives. Field surveys, field measurements and analyzing historical data were the most approaches followed to implement this study. The final outputs of this work have a national value nationwide： establishing a relationship among thermal comfort, energy flows and building fabric is of importance. Furthermore, it is of great importance to the decision maker for educational facilities. Research will also establish a wide platform based on scientific investigations for developing climate responsive school architecture in Jordan.

Creation of Zero CO2 Emissions School Buildings Due to Energy Use in Crete-Greece

Decrease of energy consumption in buildings and increase of the share of renewable energies in them are currently technologically and economically feasible and it is promoted by E.U. policies. After 2019, all the new public buildings in EU countries must be near zero energy buildings reducing their energy consumption and CO2 emissions. Use of various renewable energies for heat and power generation in school buildings in Crete-Greece can result in zeroing their fossil fuels consumption and CO2 emissions. Purpose of the current work is to investigate the possibilities of creating zero CO2 emissions school buildings in Crete-Greece due to operational energy use in them. A methodology which allows the replacement of fossil fuels with renewable energies in school buildings is proposed. Solar energy, solid biomass and low enthalpy geothermal energy, which are abundant in Crete, can be used for that. School buildings in Greece consume significantly less energy, 68 KWh/m2 year, and emit less CO2, 28 kgCO2/m2 year, than the corresponding buildings in other countries. The installation cost of renewable energies systems in order to replace all fossil fuels used in school buildings in Crete-Greece and to zero their CO2 consumption due to energy use in them has been estimated at 47.42 - 87.71 €/m2, which corresponds to 1.69 - 3.13 €/kg CO2 saved.

Evaluation of the performance of demand control ventilation system for school buildings located in the hot climate of Saudi Arabia

The advantages of the demand control ventilation system(DCV)have been widely discussed in previous research studies.However,the literature has not addressed the benefits of DCV on controlling indoor CO_(2)concentration and minimizing cooling energy consumption for school buildings located in extremely hot climates.Therefore,this paper contributes to the development of DCV and mechanical ventilation systems through a comprehensive evaluation of these systems to maintain acceptable indoor air quality(IAQ)while minimizing cooling energy demands for school buildings located in the harsh hot climate of Saudi Arabia.The evaluation is based on a calibrated whole-building energy model and validated IAQ predictions using field data obtained from a school case study in Jeddah.The results of this research study confirm that hourly and sub-hourly monitoring of indoor CO_(2)concentration is required to ensure optimal design and operation of the ventilation systems in schools.In addition,the analyses indicate that a 13%increase in cooling energy end-use can result for any additional 0.1 students/m^(2)density increase in the classrooms.However,the energy penalties related to ventilation needs can be reduced by up to 25%using DCV instead of conventional mechanical ventilation systems for school buildings located in Saudi Arabia’s hot climate.

Evaluation （POE） of Yildiz Technical University （YTU） School of Foreign Languages （SFL）

This paper deals with the post-occupancy performance evaluation of the SFL （School of Foreign Languages） that was designed by the authors and is located within the YTU （Yildiz Technical University） Davutpaa campus in Istanbul. After the completion and occupation of the building, project review came into question and a POE was performed. Post-occupancy performance evaluation tries to answer the questions of space provision for social interaction： ＂How is this building working？＂ ＂Is it intended？＂ ＂How can it be improved？＂ and ＂How can future buildings be improved？＂ Answers to these vital questions are searched under four main sections. In the first section, the study discusses the physical location and functional properties of the building, in the second, the design decisions of the building are discussed in the context of and design principles, in the third, the method of performance evaluation is explained, and in the final section, the results are analyzed and discussed. These results will lead to a path to improve the quality of the building.

Assessing Occupational Exposure to Surface Contaminants in Kuwaiti Educational Buildings

The prevalence of surface contaminants,such as potentially harmful bacteria,within building environments in the State of Kuwait is not known.To the authors’knowledge,this article is the first of such a report.A total of 342 stool samples were collected from 46 secondary schools to evaluate indoor occurrences of E.coli bacteria within selected lavatory surfaces.After microbiological testing,the results for the spread of the E.coli bacteria were categorized by total count,sampling location dependency,contamination level comparison between genders,and lavatory fixtures(i.e.seat and squat toilets).The results revealed that 7 schools have a bacterial contamination problem,there is cross-contamination between surfaces in the lavatory stalls,the boys’lavatories were less sanitary than the girls’,and that the squat-style toilets are more contaminated than the seat-style.The results suggest that there is significant risk of spread of bacterial infection among students via contaminated hands and surfaces in the lavatory area in some schools.Thus,this study emphasizes the need to improve environmental hygiene and enhanced sanitation in these schools.In addition,conclusions can be drawn as to the effectiveness of the janitorial staff employed by the schools and the efficacy of the cleaning regime used in the lavatories.Furthermore,based on the findings,there are architectural design consequences as squat-style toilets might be excluded in lavatories designed for schools to be constructed in the future.

Energy Performance versus Indoor Environment QualitymNon-traditional Form of Elementary Schools Renovation in Terms of Slovak Republic

The content of contribution is to analyse suggested renovation of school building in term of energy performance and indoor environment quality. There were three selected variants of possible reno ration of school building. At first, it was installation of equipment for heat recovery into existing mechanical ventilation system. There were further evaluated possibilities how to use glass atrium or ground air-heat exchanger in mechanical ventilation system. These suggested variants were analysed in field of energy performance, namely in term of impacts on heat demand for space heating in order to keep required parameters of indoor environment quality according to standard STN EN 15251 （operative temperature, relative air humidity, air change rate）. The analysis was elaborated by using energy simulation tool Design Builder in order to evaluate yearlong operation of buildings.

Building Features in Schools That Influence Academic Performance

School decision makers are faced with a great many decisions when considering a school renovation or new school building. All stakeholders want a building that is safe and provides an optimal learning environment. However, it is often difficult to know which building features will have the greatest effect on student learning. Because of a limited understanding of the relationship between individual building features and student learning, researchers at the University of Oklahoma hope to explore how building components influence student and teacher performance. This paper explores the importance of school building features that can be designed and changed during a renovation project. The hope is to one day determine which features have the greatest impact on student test scores. The research team believes that although it is difficult to find the exact relationship between each building features and student outcomes with one study, if multiple users repeat the same or similar studies, hopefully we will one day know the effect of these building features. In order to develop feature building users survey and physical assessment tools, it was necessary for investigators to develop a list of important building features and their associated definitions in layman terms. This was accomplished through utilization and conducting of a CAB （community advisory board） and subject matter expert materials. In addition, previous research relating to different school building features and their associations with student performance were reviewed. To define and narrow the list the researchers, community educational, and building professionals rated based on their professional experience, how directly related each feature is to student performance. The building feature list serves as a starting point to determine which features should be analyzed in a later phase of the project. It is hoped that resulting tools based on the work of this project can be used by school decision-makers and researchers to access building features that have been identified through research as being important for student and teacher performance.