Building schools with a long term design life, and standards maintained to avoid the deterioration that has been seen in schools built in the past, is a core objective of this initiative. We are committed to achieving best practice in all aspects of this programme.

The DCSF commissioned designs for schools to identify some ideas and concepts can be used to improve design quality in BSF. Multidisciplinary teams of leading architects and designers have worked with educationalists and the DCSF to prepare a series of scheme designs for new primary schools, secondary schools and an ‘all-through’ all–age school, on different types of sites, to demonstrate the design quality that should be able to be achieved within the funding available in BSF and other programmes.

The exemplar designs should be seen as a quality benchmark, a source of inspiration and as a starting point for schools, local authorities and their partners to develop tailored designs to meet the needs of individual schools.

A small number of schools are chosen by the local authority as a cross-section of the type of schools the LEP will aim to deliver. Designs for these schools, known as sample schemes, are developed during the procurement process and form a significant part of the evaluation process to select the private sector partner.

Sample schemes are normally limited to two - one new build / PFI school and
one remodelled/refurbished school (sometimes with one SEN as well). Subsequent schools will be designed and delivered by the LEP after the award of the contract.

We believe that the involvement of all users of schools and their facilities – students, school staff, and members of the local community – is vital to ensure that the new or remodelled buildings will inspire new ways of learning and benefit the whole community. There are a number of ways to get involved, including:

• JoinedupdesignforBSF workshops, run by the Sorrell Foundation, which gives students the opportunity to act as a client team and feed their ideas and research into the design process.
• Public meetings, exhibitions in public spaces, and public information on local authority websites are used by local authorities to seek the views of members of the community.
• Governors, staff and students may be asked to join a school working group to contribute to the brief or output specification, and help evaluate design proposals for their school.

The Design Quality Indicator (DQI) is a pioneering process for evaluating the design quality of buildings. Design quality has always been difficult to measure due to its subjective nature but the DQI applies a structure to measuring it.

The Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM) is a comprehensive method of measuring how sustainable a building is, how much energy it uses and its impact on the environment.

It is intended to guarantee a minimum level of  environmental performance for school building designs, without specifying particular solutions. Designs score points for meeting various sustainability criteria and are given an overall rating. DCSF requires all BSF projects achieve a minimum BREEAM rating of “very good”. PfS is responsible for ensuring that all BSF schools comply with this requirement. It is also likely that local planning policies will require specific measures to demonstrate sustainability.

Each local authority in BSF sets up a Local Education Partnership (LEP), which will jointly procure design teams, contractors and sub-contractors to be involved in their schools. If an architectural practice wishes to work with a LEP it will need to approach the leading private sector body in the LEP which usually will be the lead contractor. Most LEPs will be delivering a significant number of BSF schools so more than one firm of architects will be required.

The initial design work, used to prove an Outline Business Case, is overseen by Client Design Advisers (CDAs) – generally architects with appropriate expertise and experience in the schools? sector to identify the brief and produce feasibility studies. PfS has been working with RIBA to accredit RIBA architects as CDAs, to ensure there is a nationwide short–list of architects and designers with the appropriate expertise, but others may be used as CDAs in the BSF process, usually with the approval of the CABE enabler that is assigned to each local authority.

Local or small firms may be best suited to do feasibility or reference designs for ‘sample’ schools for the local authority.