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Apr 26

Education Exchange

The 21st Century Classroom, one that focuses on the Four C’s; Communication, Creativity, Collaboration, and Critical Thinking was the main topic of discussion at the inaugural Napa Valley Education Exchange, a three day conference that I was able to attend last week in Napa.  The conference attendees included school district superintendents and educators from all over the State of California.

We were treated to very informative and inspirational presentations from education futurists Dr. Yong Zhao, Ken Kay, and Dr. Pat Wolfe.  The presentations were focused on the current state of our education system and how it needs to be changed in order to support the learning needs of our current and future students.

This conference was especially interesting as I was able to learn about many of the challenges being faced by school districts.  As architects, we play an important role in developing educational environments that are inspirational to those who use them.  Flexible classroom spaces that incorporate advanced technology, flexible furniture, natural daylighting, fresh air, and good acoustics are critical elements of today’s classroom.

John Dybczak AIA

Mar 30

TLCD @ SCUP

Li Ka Shing Center at Stanford. Site of the 2012 SCUP Pacific Region Conference

Having just returned from the Society of College and University Planners (SCUP) Pacific Regional Conference at Stanford University, it’s my opinion that that SCUP puts on some of the best meetings I’ve ever attended.  With attendance limited, the conference is much more collegial than most. It’s a nice blend of design professionals and college and university planners – all of whom are extremely friendly.  Within a day you begin to greet familiar faces and occasionally someone will come up and say: “Didn’t I see you in Seattle last year?”

During the course of the conference, the attendees met in the Li Ka Shing Center in the Stanford Medical School, a fabulous new teaching center with some of the most advanced instructional technology around. It was nice to rub elbows with medical students rather than be in an anonymous hotel ballroom. Two Norman Foster buildings on the new Medical School Quadrangle bracketed the center where we met.

In addition to touring the facilities on the Stanford campus, I went on tours of the new UCSF Mission Bay campus and the Google campus in Mountain View.

At UCSF we learned about the layering of public and interactive space from macro to micro scale. New lab buildings serving 500- 600 staff are designed so that researchers, often immersed in very individual projects, will encounter each other on a regular basis. The center focuses on cross-disciplinary discovery and “translational” research facilities that link research to ground floor clinics serving patients.

At Google I learned that if you are lucky enough to get a job there, you might never buy groceries or cook again! Goggle provides up to three full free meals a day, unlimited snacks in the Micro Kitchens on each floor and has 26 cafes on the Mountain View campus. I never realized that there were 15,000 people in Mountain View helping to answer my “Google” enquiries.  This is not to mention their offices in 60 countries.

The individual presentations during the conference proper were informative and generally fast paced, providing a lot of information about master planning and higher education facility design. The three days I spent there were totally engaging and I came back with lots of information to share with our team at TLCD Architecture.

Flamingos devouring T-Rex at the Googleplex in Mountain View

UCSF Mission Bay Campus

Mar 29

Project Update for Roseland Creek Elementary School

Welcome to the Roseland Creek Elementary School.  Hard hats are required.  This new kindergarten through sixth grade school is being built for the Roseland School District and is located in the Roseland neighborhood of Santa Rosa.  With over 52,000 square feet of instructional and administrative space and a 10,000 square foot Multi-Purpose Building, this project is scheduled to be complete at the end of June.

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The project’s two classroom buildings, comprised of five kindergarten classrooms, 24 primary classrooms, a library, a computer lab, and administrative offices are connected by a two story bridge of steel and glass.  Along with the new Classroom Buildings and the Multi-Purpose Building there will be new play fields, play structures, site landscaping, parking, a bus drop off and street improvements.  Upon completion, this school will serve approximately 740 students.

Classes are slated to begin on August 20th.  With a project completion date of June 30th, we are all pushing hard to get this project completed on time.  There will be much to accomplish between the construction completion date and the start of school.  The contractor will need to finish their punch list, the classrooms and offices have to be outfitted with furniture and the teachers and administrators have to move in and organize their classrooms in preparation for school to begin.  The project team – Lathrop Construction Associates, Inc. (General Contractor), Counterpoint Construction Services, Inc. (Construction Manager), the District and TLCD, have worked together to meet this goal.  The team is pushing forward to make timely decisions and give timely responses to questions, maintain a high quality of work and remain sensitive to the project’s design and the Districts needs.  Many difficult decisions have been made to pull this project together.  But hey, this is construction!

Dec 6

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Yuba Community College – CLearlake Campus Student Services Center Update

Well…… the progress has been amazing. Since our last update the contractor’s forces have poured the concrete slabs (Devencenzi) for all three buildings, erected a portion of the wood walls (Archer) and the structural steel (Hilo Erectors) for the main building. before Christmas Sundt expects to have all of the wood framed roofs up and roofing on. This is a good thing, since we have been lucky so far that our typical winter weather has held! We will also see the metal decking finalized and the concrete put on at the second floor.

Oct 27

TLCD Named One of the Healthiest Companies in North Bay!

The team at TLCD Architecture believes in staying healthy both during and after hours. From hiking, biking and running to walking, yoga and gardening, its all about moving and staying active. To encourage healthy workplace practices, we launched the TLCD Fit Force 3 years ago. Supported by our management team, the Fit Force has been behind such activities as a health faire, a winter food cook-off, bowling tournaments, kayaking, food drives, a smoothie contest and an entire week of special events to honor Earth Week!

The opportunity to be part of the inaugural award as one of the “Healthiest Companies in the North Bay” by the North Bay Business Journal is very exciting and underscores TLCD’s commitment to bringing healthy food choices, exercise and community involvement to the workplace.

 

Oct 6

Yuba Community College – Clearlake Campus – Student Services Center

After a wet spring and a mild summer we have now completed “Increment 1 – Site Package” for the Yuba Community College Student Services Center. The program is incorporated into three buildings and is quite varied, combining Administration Services, Learning Resource Center and Career Center, Library, Culinary Arts, and Science Clasrooms (including a Cadaver Room for Anatomy classes). The design team has worked closely with Sundt Construction to meet a schedule of preparing the site building pads, adding Rammed Aggregate Piers, and providing new parking and fire access roads, ahead of the Fall semester, which started in late September. The second part of the project: Increment 2 – Building Package was approved by the Division of the State Architect and as of late September is well under way. The footings have been poured and we are moving quickly toward the slab on grade pours. After that, the students and staff will start to see steel and wood framing for the walls. The project is scheduled for completion in summer 2012, so that the Owner can take occupancy in the Fall of 2012.

Sep 27

TLCD Architecture receives award for Outstanding Architectural Project of the Year

Santa Rosa Utilities Field Office, Front Entry

Last week TLCD Architecture, together with consulting engineers Winzler & Kelly, was presented the award for 2011 Outstanding Architectural Project of the Year by the American Society of Civil Engineers.  Upon receiving the Award, DanReiter of Winzler & Kelly credited the success of the project to the vision of the Owner, the City of Santa Rosa Utilities Department, and the collaborative commitment of the entire design/construction team to see that vision through to completion.

Sustainability goals were far exceeded in this 40,000 square-foot facility and its adjacent site. Functions of a training center, offices, and utilities shops are combined into an ultra-efficient building package.  The campus incorporates a number of sustainable design elements including photovoltaic arrays, innovative daylighting, heating and cooling systems and low impact site design with bioswales and native landscaping.

Left to Right: Mark Adams, Miles Ferris, Dan Reiter, Craig Gaevert

Aug 1

TLCD Architecture Nears Completion of Family Justice Center Sonoma County

Just weeks away from completion, the Family Justice Center Sonoma County will soon be available to assist victims of family and domestic violence, sexual assault, and child and elder abuse. The center is designed to be a single source location offering comprehensive services for victims of family violence. Currently, clients must travel between numerous county locations to obtain assistance and support related to an assault. The Family Justice Center services will include assistance in shelter and housing, counseling and advocacy, and legal assistance, as well as on-site access for law enforcement investigation and prosecution attorneys. Clustering the services together provides a client-centered approach that will improve the quality of support, minimize travel between services and enhance prosecution success while reducing operation costs.

Community based support organizations to be located in the building include the YWCA, Catholic Charities, Council on Aging, Verity, Family Youth and Children Services, and Legal Aid of Sonoma County. County support services will include the District Attorney’s domestic violence advocates and attorneys, victim’s claims assistance specialists, child protective services, and County Sheriff’s investigative detectives. Local law enforcement investigators, including the Santa Rosa and Sebastopol Police Departments, will also be on site.

“The design approach is to provide a place of safety, healing, advocacy, confidentiality and change within a warm and nurturing environment”, said Dennis Kennedy of TLCD Architecture. Clients will be greeted at the entrance and escorted into the ‘nest’ where an intimate and homelike atmosphere will be provided. Inside the nest are quiet rooms for conversation between victims and their advocates, with two rooms overlooking the children’s area. A space to research support services on-line with assistance from advocates is adjacent to the quiet rooms. Victims will remain in the nest while obtaining services. Advocate spaces surround the nest, providing staff direct access to the safe area where they may meet with the victims.

For additional information on Family Justice Centers worldwide, please visit http://www.familyjusticecenter.org/.

Other referenced links:

County of Sonoma – http://www.sonoma-county.org/

YWCA – www.ywca.org/sonomacounty

Catholic Charities – http://www.srcharities.org/

Council on Aging – http://councilonaging.com/

Verity (formerly United Against Sexual Assault) – http://ourverity.org/

Legal Aid of Sonoma County – http://legalaidsc.org/

Aug 1

World’s First Protractor?

For 100 years an object languished while scientists occasionally tried to to discover it’s function – great story via the link below:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20748-egyptian-tomb-mystery-may-be-worlds-first-protractor.html

Jun 9

SDAT Recommendations and Presentation

Last night Nate and I attended the SDAT (Sustainable Design Assessment Team) presentation for the proposed Southeast Greenway project. Nate was a key member on the SDAT steering committee and was involved throughout the process. The presenters were from around the country and volunteered their time to solicit feedback from our community on how to best utilize this unique potential civic resource. They then took the feedback that was generated from multiple community workshops and incorporated it all in a preliminary sketch demonstrating how they envisioned the greenway integrating and improving the transportation network of the city with a series of one way trails and a variety of uses at selected key intersections (see sketch above). The sketch above is a diagram I generated from memory of last night’s presentation, as the official report from the SDAT team is not due to be released for several weeks. Please visit the following website for more information on the Greenway and how you can provide support.
http://www.southeastgreenway.org

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