DESIGN GUIDELINES FOR SAFE & SECURE ENVIRONMENT IN SCHOOL

Abstract

Creating safe schools are the responsibility of the entire community in which a school or school system resides. Yet, the day-to-day operation is primarily the responsibility of the teachers, the school administrators, and school security or law enforcement officers. But, before the first student walks the halls, an architect draws on paper or computer the design of the school and what will be the subsequent relationships of people and their buildings. The success or failure of that school is predisposed to the quality of design and the limitations of budget. Through the effective use and space of the built environment, there can be a reduction in the accidents and opportunity of crime, result in the improvement in the quality of environment. Making Schools Safer is a powerful concept that may be used to improve the productive use of space. Architectural features and structural enhancements and spatial definition can deter, detect, and delay potential violent offenders from entering school campuses and buildings. Incidence of accidents and crime are on increase in school campus, and safety and security are of increasing concern to school administrator, teachers and parents. Designing a safe and secure built environment, a set of guidelines is included in this thesis. An attempt has been made because there are no specified guidelines are not stringent enough regarding accidents and crime in school campus. Thesis addresses the perception and reality of increased safety and security concerns in school campus, examines the literature available on school safety and security and presents a survey of different school, examining incidences of safety and security problem and steps taken to prevent such incidences. ii In the end it proposes a set of design guidelines to Architects, planners for designing a safe and secure built environment in school by addressing accidents and crime prevention issues in the design, planning and details of buildings of school campus with special emphasis on senior secondary (co-educated) school so that better integration between accidents, crime prevention and architectural design results.