Designing for Student Wellbeing

Synopsis

Cardiff Council’s Design Framework for ‘High Quality Learning Environments’
Helen Groves, Architect Director and National Education Sector Lead, AtkinsRéalis & Cardiff Council

Aligned to Cardiff Council’s 2030 Vision for a Capital City for Learning and Opportunity, their Education Team have been driving a number of workstreams in order to realise the Goals set out within the document, in particular the development of a framework of ambition for creating ‘High Quality Learning Environments’ for new and existing schools in Cardiff. This framework builds upon Cardiff Council’s developing curriculum strategy demonstrating its direct impact and opportunity on school design.

The design framework, and similarly the curriculum strategy, draws on common themes representative of key drivers in current guidance, policy, and legislation from local-level, to Welsh Government, in order to capture the potential added value between different areas of focus and subsequently design. The design framework sets out high level principles, which are the tools for creating vibrant and engaging High Quality Learning Environments.

Some of the key themes and outputs of the framework will be explored in the presentation, demonstrating how Cardiff Council’s goals are supported and facilitated through the design framework, for example to create a ‘Learning Entitlement’ for all children and young people. This example shall consider how school design can respond to the goal for all children and young people to be able to access appropriate routes into education and learning opportunities and to ensure that no-one is left behind. This would include detailing the impact on schedules of spaces and area distribution (including adaptation, adjacencies and connectivity), opportunity to enhance Cardiff’s ambition for community focussed schools, and improving wellbeing in schools; culminating in the creation of a wellbeing hub in each school.

Uniting Student Services at the heart of the campus
Simon Doody, Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios

Cardiff University’s new Centre for Student Life brings student facing services together under one roof at the centre of the City Campus. Part of the biggest campus upgrade in a generation the building it signifies the importance student wellbeing and future potential to the mission of the university.
CSL is a single gateway for all non-academic student enquiries. Students only have to ask their question, or tell their story, once – the Centre for Student Life joins up the people and processes necessary to provide the answer, making all services more visible and accessible. It enables new approaches to service provision, including peer-to-peer assistance, supported self-help and technology-enabled delivery.

Located on Park Place, the building responds to its somewhat formal civic location at the heart of the University, with a sweeping colonnade that unites town and gown.

This case study looks at how key issues of student wellbeing, orientation and estate development were addressed to create a welcoming and inviting building for staff, students and the public on a complex and constrained site.