Culture + History, School and Community

ABSTRACT: 

Bringing a high school into the next-generation while maintaining and celebrating its history and culture

This session will compare two urban areas – Los Angeles, CA and San Antonio, TX, and how two high schools are responding to community desires to maintain the important history and culture of the past while bringing facilities up-to-date and evolving the architecture to support next-generation teaching and learning. Community engagement strategies and educational signage and graphics help communicate each site’s special history in unique ways.

Roosevelt HS was built in 1922 in Boyle Heights, one of the oldest neighborhoods in Los Angeles, CA. With a rich history of immigrant groups, artwork and murals that tell their stories are the backdrop to the community. A Comprehensive Modernization Project pays homage to this unique history and continues to connect the school to its cultural roots.  

Lanier HS of San Antonio, TX, is home to the Engineering Career Institute, a district magnet program offering students opportunity to focus in one of four different strands or majors. The 181,000 SF academic building, built in 1975, is the focus of major renovation work on the 1700 student campus.

Learning Objectives

OBJ #1  Recognize broad community engagement strategies and the importance to the success of a public project.

OBJ #2  Understand how to develop a community based foundational vision.  

OBJ #3  Communicate the value of a transparent process that harnesses the values of diverse stakeholders.

OBJ #4  Become familiar with how to translate that vision into a basis of design.