S.D.F.C.O.P- Social development for children of Paskuqan

Name: The shape of future

Subtitle: S.D.F.C.O.P- Social development for children of Paskuqan

After our visit in Paskuqan we noticed many problems starting from infrastructure and ending with pollution, informality, education etc. After analyzing the information, we choose that the topic that we wanted to focus is ‘education’. We should help the younger generation, especially the children who now are living in ghetto, and show them that they are accepted, they are part of the community and with a little bit of work they can become great people. They are trapped in their small community. They think that all they can do is to follow the steps of their parents. Building a new school in their area we think that the children’s perspective will change for better. We aim to create a better relationship between the two sides of the river.

Neighborhood by itself is seen as one of the many social contexts that shape children's cognitive, emotional and social development. However, the neighborhood context does not simply ‘imprint’ itself on children, but can be mediated or moderated by other social contexts, in particular the family context through parenting practices. A child’s home has a particularly strong impact on school readiness. Children from low-income families often do not receive the stimulation and do not learn the social skills required to prepare them for school. Typical problems are parental inconsistency (with regard to daily routines and parenting), frequent changes of primary caregivers, lack of supervision and poor role modelling. Very often, the parents of these children also lack support.

In our case, despite the fact that there were not many options and possibilities for education, such as schools, children don’t have the feeling of study or aiming for better life and greater things, but what is more shocking is the fact that they aren’t encouraged from their parents to continue their studies due to their lack of education. It goes as a cycle.

It’s a problem that is faced worldwide. Many improved and developed countries nowadays continue to face such problems in particular neighborhoods or zones of the city. Educational outcomes are one of the key areas influenced by family incomes. Children from low-income families often start school already behind their peers who come from more affluent families, as shown in measures of school readiness. The incidence, depth, duration and timing of poverty all influence a child’s educational attainment, along with community characteristics and social networks. However, international interventions have shown that the effects of poverty can be reduced using sustainable interventions. Pediatricians and family doctors have many opportunities to influence readiness for school and educational success in primary care settings.

School readiness reflects a child’s ability to succeed both academically and socially in a school environment. It requires physical well-being and appropriate motor development, emotional health and a positive approach to new experiences, age-appropriate social knowledge and competence, age-appropriate language skills, and age-appropriate general knowledge and cognitive skills. It is well documented that poverty decreases a child’s readiness for school through aspects of health, home life, schooling and neighborhoods. Six poverty-related factors are known to affect child development in general and school readiness in particular. They are the incidence of poverty, the depth of poverty, the duration of poverty, the timing of poverty (eg, age of child), community characteristics (eg, concentration of poverty and crime in neighborhood, and school characteristics) and the impact poverty has on the child’s social network (parents, relatives and neighbors).

Local schools are active participants in creating the holistic plan for broad revitalization. The neighborhood association considers schools an on-going partner in carrying out initiatives tied to academic achievement. Building a higher level school community relationship challenges historical traditions of school resistance to meaningful involvement with community groups working to improve schools.

As I mentioned above, the existence of these low-income neighborhoods can be found anywhere and through different periods of time, because it isn’t a new phenomena since it has its roots from the previous times.

Below are listed some case studies where in different countries are taken initiatives in fighting and lowering the impact of these neighborhoods through education and creation of new schools, universities, etc. The same thing we are aiming to do in Paskuqan, where we want to take care firstly of the children because they are the new generation and than impacting on their parents and all other inhabitants around, making it a better place.

Project: Buddhanimit Temple / Skarn Chaiyawat + Rina Shindo + Witee Wisuthumporn

Architects: Skarn Chaiyawat, Rina Shindo, Witeewisuthumporn

Location: Kut Chap District, Udon Thani, Thailand

Project Year: 2017

Buddhanimit Temple, located in a rural community in Udon Thani, Thailand, is a temple school that provides free education for families who are unable to afford public education.  Due to increasing number of students enrolled as novice monks, an extension dormitory building is required. After thorough site inspections and workshops with monks and novices, the architects proposed an economical scheme to renovate an existing abandoned classroom building on site into a dormitory. This leaves enough money to provide additional library and washroom for the novice monks. Novice Living Quarters intends to produce a design that is environmental friendly, respective to context, and contributing to the novice monks’ ways of living.

Project: Neeson Cripps Academy c

Architects: COOKFOX Architects

Location: Phnom Penh, Cambodia

Project Year: 2017

The Neeson Cripps Academy is a school for secondary education in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, built for the Cambodian Children's Fund. Located in a neighborhood of extreme poverty adjacent to the site of the former Steung Meanchey garbage dump, the school provides high-quality education to 400 of the city's most disadvantaged children, aged 13-18, with a robust English-language program, STEAM curriculum, and globally-connected learning.

The design prioritizes use of daylighting in classrooms and circulation spaces to reduce demand for energy and provide learning benefits to the students. On-site photovoltaics provide a portion of the school's energy needs, and low-energy lighting and low flow fixtures reduce operating costs. The photovoltaics are integrated into the roof design as a rain and sun shade that protects a multipurpose sports court.

A significant portion of the building is dedicated to flexible gathering spaces designed to encourage strong long-term social networks and collaborative learning among students. Much of the ground level is open to provide a covered gathering space with a visual connection to a large courtyard garden, and to lessen the school’s vulnerability to flooding.

Project: Achievement Preparatory Academy Public Charter Middle School

Architects: Studio Twenty Seven Architecture

Location: Washington, DC, United States

Project Year: 2016

 Achievement Preparatory Academy is a high-performing, college preparatory school located east of the Anacostia River in Washington, DC. Founded to close the achievement gap and address the educational needs of the community, Achievement Prep is an award-winning school that has been recognized for having an immediate impact in closing the achievement gap between low-income and affluent students in Washington, DC. Achievement Prep scholars have been among the top performing scholars in the District, often outperforming their peers in more affluent neighborhoods. The new middle school is a building designed to close the achievement gap in the District’s Ward 8 Community. 

Participatory evaluation of aspiring sustainable schools and their pedagogical potential has recently come into focus. A few authors have made a significant start in examining schools as both environmentally and socially sustainable environments, which might simultaneously represent the ‘third teacher’. However, discussion around this idea is new in Spain. This paper describes a participatory post-occupancy study conducted with teachers and pupils in Fort Pienc School, Barcelona, Spain. Findings reveal the pedagogical potential of the school’s spaces and fabric, characterized as ‘sustainable’, and highlight the aspects that the research participants feel are performing and underperforming. The paper concludes that if we want sustainable schools to be a strategy for renovating the educational process and for leading us towards a better tomorrow globally and locally, new models for exploring the pedagogical potential of sustainable schools should be developed and the efforts of all relevant parties synchronised; from architects to governments, from pupils to teachers.

ARCHITECT: ALVARO SIZA

LOCATION: VIA PANORÂMICA, PORTO, PORTUGAL

YEAR: 1985 - 1996

The School of Architecture of Porto articulates along the limits of an ancient farm right next to the Douro river, creating a wide central space, like an interior square, surrounded by the built volumes. This intervention reveals a lot of sensibility with the surroundings, in communication with the river and the sea. Stairs and ramps distribute the various accesses to the different levels and functional zones. The apparent fragmentation of the build volumes, visible on the project drawings, recovers its continuity in the circulation at the inferior level.

The location of the School whose first site was allocated for the project in 1984, has two major territorial characteristics:

1- It is a space being on the banks of the Duero River presents a landscape and a remarkable vegetation.

2- Being located in the middle of the access to the Porto-Lisbon motorway is given an intermediate and peripheral character.

PROJECT: FUJI KINDERGARTEN

Architect: TEZUKA ARCHITECTS 

LOCATION: TOKYO, JAPAN

Year: 2007

The oval-shaped roof deck of this playful Tokyo kindergarten allows children to play and run endless laps around it – a feature that has just won it the 2017 Moriyama RAIC International Prize.

Completed by Tezuka Architects 10 years ago, Fuji Kindergarten is located in the Tachikawa suburb of the city. It accommodates 600 children aged between two and six.

There is no play equipment installed, instead the architecture itself functions as a giant playground. Children are allowed to move about freely, fall down and get wet within a safe environment.

“Just as a fish cannot live in purified water, children cannot live in a clean, quiet and controlled environment,” says Takaharu Tezuka. And when the children first started interacting the building it was an emotional moment, Tezuka tells Dezeen: “It was simple, they just started running, said Tezuka. “It was beyond our expectations. I was sitting with the principal and everyone had tears. It was amazing, an instant reaction.”

New Technologies applied nowadays.

1   -‘Tree hopper’

Originally the ‘Tree hopper’ was aimed to support the city (and it’s inhabitants), overwhelmed with permanent rush and luck of time, due to significant commuting and inefficient urban space organization. 

Finding a moment to connect with nature within the endless expanding envelopes of our global cities is becoming a rarity, even though increasing webs of transport infrastructure allow us to reach secluded peaceful natural environments with greater ease.

‘Tree hopper’ is a new public city infrastructure that allows you to disconnect from the city - in the city. It combines the satisfaction of pitching your own tent with the excitement of occupying a tree 
canopy at the convenience of strolling to the park next door.

2-Illuminated 3D Printed Installation

A luminous tetrahedral mesh spanning 10 meters, (Ultra) Light Network is the latest 3D printed innovation achieved by Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) Professors Felix Raspall and Carlos Banon, who were also behind this mesh pavilion last year. Displayed at this year’s iLight Marina Bay in Singapore, the interactive light sculpture is an exploration of how full-scale 3D printed components can create a system to “address not only structural requirements but also power transmission, and information communication within a seamless and continuous aesthetic.”

3-The Flatiron Public Plaza has unveiled its centerpiece for this year’s “23 Days of Flatiron Cheer” – SOFTLab's Nova, the winner of a closed-competition. hosted by the Flatiron/23rd Street Partnership Business Improvement District (BID) and Van Alen Institute. The project will become the center of the neighbourhood’s festivities for the holiday season, as well as “a highly visible landmark” in the heart of New York.