Examines the substance of creativity and the process of developing staff creative expression so that both student and teacher can learn more about their individual creativity. (RK)

Author recommends activities designed to help teachers in some way become more creative, more sensitive in their responses to other people and their work, more flexible in developing environments for learning, and more confident of the value of their work in teaching and in other areas. (Author/CB)

Brookdale Community College near Lincroft, New Jersey, features architecture designed around flexible open spaces capable of being shaped and reshaped to meet changing needs. The architect functioned as catalyst, and the occupants shape their environment with the open space and components he provided. (Author)

Article describes an educational situation where the principal, teachers, students and community were undermined by a selfish and short sighted central administration. (ML)

When teachers of Village South Elementary School, Centerville, Ohio, planned a program and a school to contain it, the result was open. (Editor/EA)

A recent national study of the influence of openness of school buildings on teaching practices and pupil outcomes has found that open area schools were associated with lower scores on basic skills tests. Several possible explanations are suggested based on the history of the open building innovation and observed school use patterns. (MSE)

Data collected in both classroom and open design schools suggest that teacher-pupil interactions in classrooms are not as routine as is often assumed, and that open plan schools may not provide for dynamic and fruitful teacher-teacher interaction to the extent that was earlier thought to be the case. (Author/NQ)

The authors highlight some of the findings of their forthcoming book, "Open Plan Schools: Teaching, Curriculum, and Design," which will evaluate open plan schools in England. These schools now comprise over 10 percent of all primary schools. (KC)

This research evaluated the effects of a design modification in an open-plan high school. The addition of several variable height partitions throughout the school reduced classroom interruptions and increased content questions. Hypotheses about specific design mechanisms contributing to environment-behavior congruence in open plan schools were…

Focuses on a comparison of the academic achievement of groups of children in formal and informal classrooms of primary schools, the CPQ profiles of 43 pairs of children matched for sex and IQ level during their fourth academic year, and the relationship between second-order factors and selected measures of achievement in the two schools.…

Excerpts from an architect's return to Virginia school almost 12 years after completion of the design and construction project. Originally designed for open-space education in 1975, the school was subsequently partitioned to form traditional classroom spaces. (MLF)

Overall, the research to date indicates that such innovations, when properly interpreted and implemented, may be a step toward educational improvement and are, in any case, valid alternatives to the traditional mode of teaching. (Author)

The Piscataway (New Jersey) high school uses recessed windows and an integrated heat recovery system, made possible by its modular design, to conserve energy. Available from: New Jersey School Boards Association, P.O. Box 909, Trenton, New Jersey 08605. (Author/MLF)

Author proposed a set of concepts and methods for the measurement of educational environments. He compared the activity-with-facility (synomorph) patterns of schools of both open-plan and traditional architecture. (Editor/RK)