Building connections

Some commentators flag the inherent tension between the restricted physical environment of schools and the open and public nature of community facilities as a fundamental challenge. Legitimate concern over risks to students extends to concerns over risk to school property, which can result in restricted access to valuable recreational assets for local communities outside normal school hours. Yet, there is limited evidence internationally that locking up schools is a deterrent to vandalism or major damage. Studies suggest that the integration of schools with surrounding communities, through design, community connections and extended hours of use, is a better deterrent. This is no surprise to urban scholars. The American urbanist Jane Jacobs argued persuasively for the benefits of “eyes on the street” – movement and activity in public places – more than 70 years ago.

Indeed, determination to improve school–community relations, and better connect community members with each other through the school’s agency, is evident in the most dramatic circumstances. A workshop on the extended use of schools, hosted in 2021 by the University of Melbourne, heard moving evidence about the redevelopment of Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut in the US, following the shooting deaths of 26 students and staff in 2012. School leaders and their architects redesigned the campus to explicitly resist a securitised environment, arguing that the school should remain welcoming, calm and connected to the natural elements. Design concepts like openness and clear sightlines, as well as subtle and concealed safety features, were used to balance practical security measures with a desire to renew community confidence and cohesion.

Schools in the urban realm

Cultural, geographical and institutional settings are significant determinants of the relationships between schools and their surrounding communities. Influential urban planners, such as the American Clarence Perry who led on the 1929 New York Regional Plan and the English town planner Patrick Abercrombie, best known for his plan to rebuild Greater London in the wake of the Second World War, identified local schools as key ‘neighbourhood units’ and urged their integration into the urban and social fabric. Yet, educational authorities have conventionally operated in siloed bureaucracies, largely disconnected from areas of government dealing with social and urban policy. Neo-liberal education settings adopted by western economies in recent decades have also promoted school choice over location-based enrolment, further weakening community affiliation with local schools. A focus of education policy on academic attainment and school league tables has also contributed to a division between curriculum and community. Education is a private and positional good, underpinning career choice and mobility, but it is also a social and public good. Local schools that are well integrated with their communities can encourage the social mix and everyday multiculturalism that are ingredients of inclusive societies, while offering programmes that respond to particular needs.

Some jurisdictions have followed alternative paths. Local schools in Denmark are designed and resourced for extended use and there is an expectation that school facilities can be accessed by local residents. Municipal-level administration of schools may assist in promoting integrated infrastructure planning and shared use. At ‘The Heart’ in Ikast-Brande (Denmark), the multifunctional buildings and outdoor areas support a variety of school and adult education classes, plus community events, exercise and recreational pursuits. Informal places for community members to work are also provided, including a cafe and office facilities. Jurisdictional divisions in countries such as Australia – where community planning is undertaken by city governments and educational planning by state (provincial) authorities – introduce greater structural impediments to integrated planning and the development of shared-use arrangements. Less rigid separation between formal and informal education, where compulsory years schooling is one element of a lifelong learning model (again, the long-established Danish folkehøjskole or folk high school is an interesting example) may also be a positive influence on sharing school infrastructure.

The challenge of climate change

The School Strike 4 Climate movement highlighted the urgent concern about global warming among students worldwide, causing some to call on students and schools to focus on learning rather than politics. Climate change, however, disrupts the dichotomy between ‘the school’ and ‘the world’. School infrastructure and pedagogy both play vital roles in supporting community resilience as we respond and adapt to the imminent impacts of global warming.

Imagination and leadership, when supported by research, can build productive links between school campuses and wider urban and environmental settings. For example, inner-urban school campuses may have limited open space, but some of that space can be integrated within urban biodiversity corridors that support the movement of species across habitats. Such initiatives may be integrated into science and environmental curricula. Similarly, the global movement to grow food on school campuses can link to wider urban farming movements while also contributing educational opportunities. Schools have also successfully met the challenge of developing sustainable energy and water systems on campuses. South Fremantle Senior High School, located in a region of Western Australia that is experiencing a significant, long-term rainfall decline, began a journey to become carbon neutral as far back as 2007.

Developing resilient communities requires active social networks and forms of shared identity to drive productive change. Schools have the cultural capital to act as the anchors in mixed-use public service precincts. In partnerships with other organisations, many would have the capacity to offer what Demos identified as “relational public services that can bring together local communities and make it easier for people to build relationships with other users, the community at large and people who provide the services”.

The social isolation and economic vulnerability ensuing from Covid-19 have brought a set of challenges to which local institutions can uniquely respond and which should spur us to rethink the role of schools as critical community infrastructure. With funding, investment and partnerships, schools have the potential to adapt to difficult circumstances and respond well to crises, both acute and pervasive. Extended- or full-service schools as physical, informational and social infrastructure can play more significant roles in supporting the education, health and wellbeing of local communities on an ongoing basis. The potential wide-ranging benefits of multisectoral partnerships should see schools reimagined as even more important and influential hubs of community than they already are.  

The authors are lead researchers on an Australian Research Council funded project Building Connections: Schools as Community Hubs. 

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This article first appeared in the RSA Journal Issue 1 2022.