St. Louis Place Elementary School
Gun violence has been a serious problem in the United States for many years. Approximately 3 million children in the US are exposed to shootings each year. More than 3,000 children and teens are shot and killed and more than 15,000 are shot and injured. Now safety protocols and guidelines have been applied to the most American public schools, by means of constructing school fortress, defensive mechanism and running active-shooter drills. However, before laying the first brick and agitating the students, school design can be the primary method preventing danger that starts much earlier, with the additional competence to be softer: preventing the school from looking or feeling too similar to a prison.
The goal of the project is to make students feel safer while at the same time maintaining free movement and aesthetic appeal. Based on the fact that gunfire occurs most often at schools with a high proportion of black students, the site study focus on the north of St. Louis, around St. Louis Place Neighborhood where 84% of the residents are African American and the demographics meets the demand of building a new school.