School Building Projects Research Articles

Towards developing partnership models for leveraging design for manufacture and assembly for school buildings

The substantial efforts made in implementing design for manufacture and assembly (DfMA) in construction developments thus far have been scattered. Past research has focused on the operational practice of volumetric and non-volumetric assembly, component manufacture and sub-assembly and modular building. This paper seeks to cover a comprehensive review with case studies to explore how DfMA can be leveraged in the design and delivery of school buildings. Three case studies were conducted to demonstrate how DfMA methods were applied in actual projects, identifying the challenges and issues confronted. The adopted techniques and involved challenges in school building projects were identified along with the capability and risk profiles that come with the opportunities to lead DfMA projects. Re-engineering as an aspect to engage in DfMA-led construction developments and how this may impact the current services of a construction firm were evaluated. The results reveal effective partnership models for establishing a sustainable business model for DfMA school buildings followed by a project feedback collection model. The partnership models developed provide guidance on establishing relationships to achieve the maximum potential of DfMA in school projects. The project feedback collection model promotes better circulation of lessons learned for advancement in future projects.

Monte Carlo simulation in an elementary school building

Education is the future. Education is the only way for a country to start developing and reducing poverty. In countries with medium incomes like Peru, the resources to spend on education is not unlimited. Therefore, it is necessary to have quality in investment. However, risks and uncertainty can make a project surpass its initial budget. Therefore, statistic based methods like Monte Carlo simulation is a powerful tool to forecast possible events that might endanger the profitability and sustainability of a project. Although there is not plenty of academic literature about Monte Carlo empirical usage, many projects employ this method to manage the possible risks the project could have. In consequence, the current research analyzed both risk and sensitivity of an elementary school building project. Both analyses showed that this project had huge probabilities to surpass the current profit and return estimations. However, the sensitivity analysis portrayed that the project could be endangered because of infrastructure overspending. Moreover, it indicated that students’ attendance is also a critical factor to ensure the sustainability of the project.

PREDICTING THE SCHEDULE AND COST PERFORMANCE IN PUBLIC SCHOOL BUILDING PROJECTS IN TAIWAN

The Ministry of Education (MOE) of Taiwan invests about NTD 30 billion a year in Public School Building Projects (PSBPs). However, 95% of the PSBPs have been extended and have incurred increased costs. A PSBP performance evaluation and prediction system was established by using the Fuzzy Delphi Method (FDM), association rules and an Artificial Neural Network (ANN). Sixty-two Taiwanese PSBPs were used as the samples, while eleven high correlation factors that influence the project performance of PSBPs were defined, and the reasons leading to the poor project performance were discussed in this study. Moreover, the results of the test cases operated by ANN showed that the accuracy rate for schedule and cost variability predictions can reach 84%. The high accuracy rate indicated the reliability of priority control for high-risk projects in the future. The proposed approach can be provided to clients, design and construction firms, and project managers to understand the project performance in real time and to establish a dynamic tracking review and response measures for improving the overall project satisfaction.

Facilitating claims settlement using building information modeling in the school building projects

Claims have a lot of space in construction projects, as they can have a considerable monetary value and thus negatively affect the final amount and duration of the project. This study seeks to suggest a building information modeling (BIM) approach to reduce most of the root causes of claims during the design phase. Thus, claims can be reduced during the project implementation phase. A questionnaire form was designed and distributed to 28 experts to obtain expert opinions on construction claims’ most important causes. In return, data were collected for 128 projects in Iraq, and the reasons for claims were extracted from them. After making the match between experts’ opinions and real projects, it was found that the match rate is high and that there are sixteen critical reasons for construction claims in Iraqi projects. After matching these causes with the BIM functions, a flowchart of each cause is drawn, and the inputs, tools, and outputs of the process are identified. The results showed the ability of BIM to prevent eight significant causes of claims (inaccurate quantities, excessive change orders, errors and design changes, flaws in drawings and specifications, and poor coordination between designers (structural, architectural, MEP)) through these BIM functions (3D visualization, clash detection, coordination, and take-off). The main results applied to a realistic case study show that BIM technology can be used as a precautionary approach during the design stage to reduce claims during implementation by (55.2%) so that the functions of this technology can solve the fundamental causes of claims in the construction projects sector in Iraq.

Environmental Innovations in the Construction of Social Infrastructure Facilities in Agricultural Holdings

The article considers the problem of building social infrastructure facilities in agricultural holdings and proves that the use of environmental innovations in the construction of such facilities not only leads to a reduction in resource and carbon intensity, but also provides a social and environmental effect due to informing and educating the population. Environmental innovations in the construction of social facilities can be used for the purposes of environmental education and training of not only children but also adults through open lessons, thematic lectures and demonstrations of sustainable construction techniques. As an example, we present the results of comparative evaluation of carbon footprint of the school building project with kindergarten and cultural and leisure center made of traditional monolithic reinforced concrete structures and 3D polystyrene foam panels, obtained with SimaPro 9.1.1.1 software. It is shown that the use of innovative construction technology leads to a reduction of the carbon footprint in the life cycle of a building by 1.5 times compared to traditional technology.

School architecture, global perspectives, and local realities: the cases of Chile and Portugal in the twentieth century

ABSTRACTThis paper discusses the duality between global perspectives and local realities that have influenced the design of the school architecture by examining and comparing state school projects in two geographically distant countries: Chile and Portugal. The proposals and experiences of the “Society for the Construction of Educational Facilities” (1937–1987) in Chile and the “Board of Constructions for Technical and Secondary Education” (1934–1969) in Portugal are analysed. Established in the 1930s, these centralised bodies managed, organised, and controlled state school building projects in such a way as to achieve uniformity in design, creating architectural identities that embodied both the educational values and the representative character of the State. These bodies were influenced by similar global circumstances, and their activities were guided by the recommendations issued by intergovernmental organisations of the time. Such a situation brought their projects closer together in terms of their functional, aesthetic, technical-constructive characteristics. After examining and identifying the international influences which brought them closer in terms of the educational meanings and values associated with school architecture, the paper identifies the local circumstances that guided the design and construction processes of schools in both countries, bringing fresh geographical insights to school architecture discussion. At the same time, possible global readings of strategies, influences and results are explored, enabling us to understand school architecture as part of a nation’s cultural values and as a material expression of the social model of modernity, which will continue to meet the challenges that schools face in twenty-first-century society.

Social Interventions, Health, and Well-Being

We analyze the long-run and intergenerational effects of a large-scale school building project (INPRES) that took place in Indonesia between 1974 and 1979. Specifically, we link the geographic rollout of INPRES to longitudinal data from the Indonesian Family Life Survey covering two generations. We find that individuals exposed to the program have better health later in life along multiple measures. We also find that the children of those exposed also experience improved health and educational outcomes and that these effects are generally stronger for maternal exposure than paternal exposure. We find some evidence that household resources, neighborhood quality, and assortative mating may explain a portion of our results. Our findings highlight the importance of considering the long-run and multigenerational benefits when evaluating the costs and benefits of social interventions in a middle-income country.

Developing a system for assessing the sustainability in school building projects

In recent times, the concept of sustainability has become a focus of attention for many institutions and communities. The reason for the spread of this concept and great interest is the pursuit of sustainable development of societies which aims at balancing the three factors: environmental, economic, and social. This paper aims to develop a system to implement sustainability ideas in school building projects based on the international guidelines and practices for sustainability. For example, (Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM)-Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED)-The Pearl Building Rating System (PBRS)) and the current practices in Iraq. The purpose of the collected and reported information was for making decisions during various stages of preconstruction, construction, and post-construction. The system employed suitable criteria, subcriteria, and standard weights for school buildings assessment, which was set according to a field survey. The survey included interviewing a group of specialists in school buildings and conducting a closed questionnaire. A computer program was prepared to assess school buildings in the 3rd General Directorate of Education in Baghdad-Karkh. These buildings were executed during (2008–2018). The School buildings were classified into four types (traditional, precast concrete units, steel structures, and structural concrete construction). The field survey has shown that the highest standard of sustainability is the environmental design (20.79), and the lowest sustainability criteria are water treatment system (5.81). However, the study aims to develop a sustainability assessment system for school buildings. A comparison was made between the current buildings with ones that having ideal sustainability criteria. Similarly, a monitoring was done with the perfect situation to observe the deviation within the project progress. Finally, recommendations were given for the purpose of employing the sustainability concepts in school buildings.

MİMAR ZEKİ SAYAR'IN PERSPEKTİFİNDEN 1950'LERDE MİMARLIĞA DAİR DEĞERLENDİRMELER

In order to examine the 1950s of Turkey and the world architecture from the perspective of architect Zeki Sayar who is one of the founders of Arkitekt magazine, Sayar's publications in the Arkitekt were reviewed. Among the subjects mentioned in the 1950s is the zoning policy carried out in that period and the current housing problem, the introduction of some architectural projects published in some architectural magazines from abroad, the protection of historical artifacts, information about the school building projects as a necessary architectural program of the period, architectural education and its importance. Two architectural projects carried out by Zeki Sayar in the 1950s are also mentioned in the study, which is Merbank neighborhood and Akev tobacco warehouse and administration building. This study aims to understand various issues related to architecture carried out in Turkey and around the world in the 1950s from the perspective of Zeki Sayar.

Towards a Responsive Understanding of Sustainable School Architecture

Current international strategies admit the vital importance of education as the development engine for our knowledge-based society, where sustainability is the all-encompassing vision. In this context, a school building project should not begin with a design solution. This study aims to investigate the ways in which architects can better understand sustainable strategies and also how can they translate the real users’ needs into architectural design solutions. Sustainability may be implemented both inside the school’s curricula – knowledge, skills, critical thinking, attitudes, way of life – as well as into the design approach, construction, operations and maintenance of the school building. Not only the school building in itself should be a tridimensional textbook which offers sustainability lessons, subtly, attractively and interactively, but architects can become teachers of sustainability. Education for Sustainable Development has become a long-term strategic objective across the world. The strategy adopted by The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe in 2005 aims for integrating sustainability as a central nucleus within the educational curricula by 2040. This research applies a double filter in analysing the architecture of educational facilities: “What qualifies as sustainable?” and “What could educate?”. In other words, the study answers an original filter of analysis, “What is it in the sustainable architecture of a school that has the power to educate its users?” and defines major interconnected elements of a sustainable school building: Site, Transportation / Mobility, Safety & Security, Energy, Lighting, Indoor Air Quality, Acoustics, Water Management, Waste Management, Materials & Resources, Structural Systems, Modularity & Prefabrication, Accessibility / Universal Design, Image / Awareness / Local Footprint, Interior Design & Furniture, Orientation & Signage, Health, Nutrition & Physical Activity, Operations & Maintenance, Building services, BMS, Smart / Intelligent Buildings, Information and Communications Technology, Costs & Financing, New or Rehabilitated, Innovation. An 8-boxes matrix type SWOT Analysis have been applied for each specific component, investigating the situation of existing Romanian schools. The SWOT Analysis details the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats and put forward sustainable and educational strategies. Following this study, architects may benefit from new open paths, landmarks and a research toolkit for generating original design solutions. New designed schools should be able to offer a wide range of dynamic methods of teaching architecture, engineering and environmental sciences. Therefore, Education for Sustainable Development is shaped through sustainable school architecture. If we offer users the opportunity to learn and work in educational spaces which are able to capitalize on the creative potential, in schools strategically placed within the environment and deeply rooted in their context, then children, adolescents and adults can all be proud of schools where they feel valorised, they all will be able to evolve, innovate and develop sustainable behaviours. Applying the filter of sustainability to educational purposes, architects can develop a responsive process of integrated design, based on evidence and looking towards the future.

Risk identification of Design And Build at school building construction project in central Jakarta

Based on the school data from the basic data of primary and secondary education, the Ministry of Education and Culture semester 2019/2020, in the city of Central Jakarta there are 512 school buildings consisting of 245 state schools buildings and 267 private school buildings, which with details as many as 68 Elementary School Building, 24 Junior High School buildings, 11 Senior High School Buildings, 13 Vocational School Buildings and 7 Special School Buildings. Design and build is one of the procurement of construction services work. The concept of design and build has existed from many years ago. At this time it grew and increased its use. Government-owned school building projects now implement design and build systems in the process of implementing their work. This research have a purpose to identify design and build risks on the construction of school buildings in South Jakarta. This research is also aimed at knowing the potential risk or the most dominant of design and build on the construction project of building buildings in central Jakarta. The risk factors gained are used as data to make repairs or precautions in the implementation of construction activities. The method used in this research is a survey method through distributing questionnaires to respondents, namely contractors. Then the result data from the propagation of the questionnaire is processed by using SPSS software to analyze the primary data received. This research Instrument uses 49 risk variables.

Geotechnical maps for Salah Al-Deen-Iraq

The objective of the study is to produce a digital geotechnical map of Salah Al-Deen Governorate in Iraq through employing the capabilities of GIS and remote sensing techniques. Those maps can represent the distribution of different geotechnical properties in an accurate easy to use manner. This study is performed in many phases that began with get a space map and government boundaries of the investigation area that point gather the information required for the study from public school building projects. These points position determines using a GPS then analysis the data into the program (ArcGIS10.4). The total number of the boreholes used in this research (24) points each point consists of three test boreholes with depth up to (10m). The results producing geotechnical maps for the B.C. and soil properties in the Salah Al-Deen Governorate, these geotechnical maps can provide a description clear and simple access to the properties such as bearing capacity, Gypsum Content, and Organic percent. As well as showing the quality of groundwater.

Factors influencing school building construction projects abandonment

This study explores the factors that account for the abandonment of projects within the Ghanaian public education sector. The study adopted a survey of selected contractors, project management practitioners and clients in charge of the delivery of Community Day Senior High School Building projects. Employing factor analysis and structural equation modelling, the factors were categorised into five – political leadership, culture, external forces resources/funding and administrative/institutional. All these sets of elements were statistically significant in causing Ghanaian public-sector education building construction infrastructure projects abandonment. However, the most significant collections of factors are political leadership, followed by poor administrative/institutional practices, poor resource/funding, cultural factors and external forces.

Adopting BIM Technology in Fall Prevention Plans

Building Information Modeling is a modern technique that has contributed in improvement of construction industries. Early detection of hazards during the life cycle of the project will contribute to protect the working environment from exposure to risks that will affect the time and cost. The changing nature of the sites makes it difficult in identifying the fall risks accurately. Based on BIM 4D simulation, the objective of this study is to create a computer model by using BIM technology to help accurately determine (a) the hazards of falling from the edges (b) the hazards from struck by falling objects, by relying on the opinions of safety experts in identifying potential risks and demonstrating the effectiveness of this technique in facilitating hazards acknowledgment. In this research, Iraqi safety rules and safety rules of OSHA were adopted. The research idea was applied to a school building project under construction as a case study to benefit from the research outputs in improving the safety of school’s buildings projects. The results displayed that the model prepared by the researchers helped the safety managers in understanding the details and sequence of work easily, thus contributed to the precise identification of the falling hazards, use suitable safety equipment for each risk, in addition to the possibility of using this model as a training program for workers in the workplace to help give an idea of the nature of risk which they may be exposed it, increase safety communication and generate time schedule empty from risks. Safety managers believe that this model can contribute to improve workplaces safety and prevent time and cost losses due to reliance on inaccurate methods based on static 2D schemes and sense in risk identification.

Hybrid approach to reducing estimating overfitting and collinearity

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present an approach to address the overfitting and collinearity problems that frequently occur in predictive cost estimating models for construction practice. A case study, modeling the cost of preliminaries is proposed to test the robustness of this approach. Design/methodology/approach A hybrid approach is developed based on the Akaike information criterion (AIC) and principal component regression (PCR). Cost information for a sample of 204 UK school building projects is collected involving elemental items, contingencies (risk) and the contractors’ preliminaries. An application to estimate the cost of preliminaries for construction projects demonstrates the method and tests its effectiveness in comparison with such competing models as: alternative regression models, three artificial neural network data mining techniques, case-based reasoning and support vector machines. Findings The experimental results show that the AIC–PCR approach provides a good predictive accuracy compared with the alternatives used, and is a promising alternative to avoid overfitting and collinearity. Originality/value This is the first time an approach integrating the AIC and PCR has been developed to offer an improvement on existing methods for estimating construction project Preliminaries. The hybrid approach not only reduces the risk of overfitting and collinearity, but also results in better predictability compared with the commonly used stepwise regression.

Intergenerational Human Capital Spillovers: Indonesia’s School Construction and Its Effects on the Next Generation

We analyze the effects of increased access to education in one generation on human capital outcomes in the next generation. Using longitudinal data, we exploit the geographical and cohort variations in exposure to a massive primary school construction program in the 1970s in Indonesia. We show that the school building project increases primary school completion rates among both men and women. We find that children whose mothers were exposed to the school building project score higher on the national primary school examination, suggesting the importance of maternal education in the intergenerational transmission of human capital.

Probability of change orders and the effect on cost and schedule for new public school buildings

Purpose Change orders (COs) adversely affect the cost and schedule of projects, specifically during the construction phase. COs of 95 new public school building projects contracted by the Clark County School District (CCSD) of Nevada were analyzed to quantify the cost and schedule growth as well as to determine the effect of COs on cost and schedule growth. The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach The data were collected from CCSD through questionnaire survey. Descriptive statistics and statistical tests were conducted to determine the effect of COs on cost and schedule growth. Findings It was found that the average amount of COs as well as cost and schedule overruns were 5.9, 3.0 and 7.4 percent, respectively. Statistical tests showed that the amount of COs had an adverse effect on schedule growth; schedule overruns in projects with less than 4 percent COs were significantly lower than projects with more than 4 percent COs. Cost overruns did not significantly differ in those two types of projects. The primary contribution of this study is that it provides the tools and the framework for school district engineers to determine the probability of the occurrence of COs as well as the optimum percentage of COs for a minimum effect on cost and schedule growth of new public school buildings. Probability curves were also developed to determine the likelihood of the occurrence of COs, cost growth and schedule growth in these projects. These findings could be used by school districts to avoid or reduce COs in future projects, minimizing the effect on cost and schedule growth during the construction phase. Research limitations/implications The findings and the probabilities curves developed in this study should be used carefully in other cases. These data were specific to the owner, location and types of buildings and generalizing these findings may have negative consequences. Practical implications The practical implications are that this study could provide a tool to school building administrators to determine the probability of having COs as well as cost and schedule overruns and the effects of COs on cost and schedule overruns. To the authors’ best knowledge, no other studies of this type have been conducted previously. Social implications The social implication of this study is it will help to efficiently use the tax payers’ money while building new school buildings. Originality/value This study has collected the hard data of COs, cost and schedule data of CCSD new school building projects. Therefore, the data are from the projects completed by CCSD. So, the paper is written from the original data received from CCSD.

Dematerializing the Material: Ambiguity Enabling Innovation in Strategic Change

While strategic change implies something to change giving rise to something new, it is not evident what the source for the emergence of novelty is. Our longitudinal case study documents a public school building project with an attempt to create a wholly new kind of a future learning environment, while also changing the accustomed purchasing practices of the municipality. We trace the emergence of novelty to the dynamics of ambiguity and the related practices through which the actors balance between materializing and dematerializing the object. Our study draws attention to the sociomaterial nature of ambiguity and challenges scholars to approach it in more processual terms and not only as rhetoric tools controlled by managers.

Utilization of Ilocano Traditional Materials in the Construction of Green School Building

This paper focused on the development of a low-cost green school building and construction system. It aimed to characterize the technical and financial aspects of the project utilizing the Ilocano traditional construction materials that are available in the locality. The utilization of tropical Bamboo as a sustainable source encourages industrialization and increases employment opportunities within the locality. The research design is descriptive and qualitative. The researchers formulated a textual presentation of the engineering and architectural designs of the project. The project is an elementary school building with a dimension of seven by nine meters. The project was designed using raw materials available within the locality. The estimated project cost which is P185, 018.62 is lesser than a seven by nine meters reinforced concrete building with an estimated cost amounting to P945,000.00. The project promotes and supports research and development with the view of improving efficiency of raw materials utilization and further promotes processing and utilization of tropical Bamboo that would encourage the acceptance by the Engineers and designers to shift to raw material source. It is suggested that a study on the Impact of the project be conducted in order to measure the utility of the Green School Building project.

Modeling the Completion Time of Public School Building Projects Using Neural Networks

The Ministry of Education in Iraq is confronting a colossal deficiency in school buildings while stakeholders of government funded school buildings projects are experiencing the ill effects of extreme delays caused by many reasons. Those stakeholders are particularly worried to know ahead of time (at contract assignment) the expected completion time of any new school building project. As indicated by a previous research conducted by the authors, taking into account the opinions of Iraqi experts involved with government funded school building projects, nine major causes of delay in school building projects were affirmed through a questionnaire survey specifically are; the contractor's financial status, delay in interim payments, change orders, the contractor rank, work stoppages, the contract value, experience of the supervising engineers, the contract duration and delay penalty. In this research, two prediction models (A and B) were produced to help the concerned decision makers to foresee the expected completion time of typically designed school building projects having (12) and (18) classes separately. The ANN multi-layer feed forward with back-propagation algorithm was utilized to build up the mathematical equations. The created prediction equations demonstrated a high degree of average accuracy of (96.43%) and (96.79%) for schools having (12) and (18) classes, with (R2) for both ANN models of (79.60%) and (85.30%) respectively. It was found that the most influential parameters of both models were the ratio of the sum of work stoppages to the contract duration, the ratio of contractor's financial status to the contract value, the ratio of delay penalty to the total value of contract and the ratio of mean interim payments duration to the contract duration.