School Furniture Blog

School Furniture On The Move

by Michael Fickes
 

Is built-in school furniture becoming a thing of the past?
 
 
As the interior designer worked her way down the furniture punch list at the then new Olathe Northwest High School in Olathe, Kan., she marveled at all the furniture moving through the halls. The school was preparing to open (in September of 2003) and the district’s facilities department was swapping furniture among rooms to get ready.

The custodial staff was moving desks, chairs, and storage cabinets out of a classroom and carting it off. Other workers were carrying lightweight conference tables and a wheeling a custom-made console with electrical and data connections into the room.

The school had just inked an agreement to offer students a distance-learning language lab through a university two hours away. Fortunately, the school’s flexible furniture design made it possible to design and build a distance learning language lab in a couple hours.
 

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The Learning Building 

by Jay B. Richards & Lawrence E. Peterson

Learning environments need not be limited to classrooms — the entire building can be viewed as filled with potential learning environments. 
 
After the Civil War the United States began the process of developing the “Industrial Model” school. Box-like classrooms along a double-loaded corridor were seen as the most efficient way to educate and “Americanize” the large number of immigrants coming to the United States. Despite the dramatic changes in architecture, construction science, technology, and lifestyle, the same basic model for school design is still used. While there have been upgrades, improvements, refinements, and enhancements made to the basic model, this improved environment of better lighting, ventilation, and technology is still housed in a box-like classroom along a double-loaded corridor. It seems that design of nearly every other kind of space has evolved, but the “Industrial Model” school remains relatively unchanged since the turn of the last century.

The Good Seat

by Amy Milshtein

A staple in office environments, task chairs, computer tables and other ergonomic furniture allows comfort while avoiding injuries. Are students ready for ergonomic equipment in their environment?

Ergonomics in the office environment is nothing new. Today, actively ergonomic task chairs and variable-height work surfaces protect people from a variety of musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs). A safer, healthier workplace has become de rigueur for the modern employee. But what about tomorrow’s human resources? Today’s students are computing earlier and longer than we ever will, and complaining about neck and back pain sooner they we ever did. Is the time ripe to look at ergonomics in the college environment?

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As seen in PRWeb on 11/07/06.

PRWeb) November 7, 2006 — Just hearing these words sends a sense of dread through church staff. They are not ready for the holidays. It’s just October and now they are already talking about the Holiday’s. And it’s not talking about how big a turkey to roast or how to hang stockings with care.

Instead it is talking about the physical equipment needed each year during the holidays to stage all the wonderful pageantry your church presents. While the necessary equipment such as mobile stages, risers and partitions are often the backdrop to the presentation itself, they are absolutely critical to the safety and success of the production.

To read more….click here.