Contract - March 2012 - (Page 38)

Interior Space as Commodity on Campus: An Opportunity for Designers Over many decades, on nearly all American college and university campuses, space of almost any type has been perceived as a “free good.” The origins of this sort of thinking have been fundamental to the nature of the campus itself; i.e., a utopian “place apart” that fosters faculty and student interchange and individual creative exploration in a sheltered environment. This isolation from the daily practicalities of the “real world” has been protected to the extent that major ine iciencies in the use of space and its associated costs of maintenance, renewal, and operations have become the norm in most higher education institutions. But that paradigm is changing. Recently, especially with the implementation of responsibility center management (RCM) budget systems at many campuses, there is an awakened interest in the economic value of space and its related costs. This budget model is based on a decentralized approach in which most revenue and costs are distributed among the various schools and other academic units within a university, and individual administrators become directly accountable for their program’s economic viability on an annual basis. This leads to local assessments of all aspects of the respective academic enterprises from productivity standards to resource e iciency. For those in the private sector, this seems fundamental, but it is new territory for most collegiate academic managers. In addition to reviewing the use patterns of assigned program space to check for potential ine iciencies, this overall increasing entrepreneurial awareness o ers many professional service opportunities for interior designers and architects. Beginning with fundamental programming and space planning, existing floor areas can be analyzed for improvements ranging from simple reconfiguration to new furniture, fixtures, and equipment to full-scale renovations. Better lighting and mechanical systems are also on the review agenda. In all cases, some form of cost/benefit 38 In the Claude Moore Medical Education Building at the University of Virginia, designed by CO Architects, a large round room is a flexible learning center able to house a 160-person class or small group discussions. This interior helps the School of Medicine alter its pedagogy to one of e iciency and collaboration. analysis will be in order, however, most decisions will often be bottom-line driven. While this is not entirely new to colleges and universities, the distribution of decision-making and accountability among administrators is becoming much more widely spread than in the past. There are many challenges in implementing this decentralized model into the ‘ivory towers of academe.’ One of the most significant will be maintaining quality standards for facilities and their maintenance. This demands that a college or university’s central administration, which was once responsible for all facilities, maintenance, and operations, now only has the role of setting standards and enforcing their compliance through daily oversight and annual budget review. A supplemental central approach would be to emphasize shared objectives, such as sustainability, collaboration, branding, and e iciency. The best recent architecture and interior projects on American college and university campuses prove that carefully implementing these core objectives can result in both award-winning design and decreased energy use, lower maintenance, and extended use potential. A new era of “space as commodity” can produce more imaginative outcomes and responsible stewardship in campus environments, and it is up to both conscientious campus leaders and thoughtful design professionals to make it happen. DAVID J. NEUMAN, FAIA David J. Neuman, FAIA, is the Architect for the University of Virginia, where he oversees more than $3 billion in capital projects and guides the stewardship of the cultural resources of the Academical Village designed by Thomas Je erson. He previously served as University Architect and Associate Vice Provost for Planning at Stanford University, and Campus Architect and Associate Vice Chancellor for Planning at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of Building Type Basics for College and University Facilities (Wiley, 2003). A second edition of the book will release in fall 2012. contractdesign.com MARCH 2012 PHOTO: ROBERT CANFIELD PHOTOGRAPHY http://www.contractdesign.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Contract - March 2012

Contract - March 2012
Table of Contents
Editorial
Industry News
Product Focus: Cool for School
Product Focus: User Friendly
Product Briefs: Head of the Class
Design Shaping the 21st Century College Campus
Interior Space as Commodity on Campus: An Opportunity for Designers
PACCAR Hall University of Washington
Umeå School of Architecture
Coventry University Hub
Centennial College Library and Academic Facility
Practice: Economy Fuels Design Reinvention
Designers Select: Resilient and Tile Flooring
Sources
Ad Index
Perspectives

Contract - March 2012