Quite an Education
Space-Planning Principles for Church-Based Schools

By Ernest Pullen

Ask any pastor who’s navigated the launch of a Christian academy and they’ll tell you it’s one of the most rewarding — and stressful — endeavors they’ve ever undertaken. One of the greatest challenges is striking a balance between the church’s and school’s needs.

"Churches of every size will profit from the strategic master-planning process,” says Bill Chegwidden, president of Atlanta-based architectural design firm CDH Partners. “Failure to spend the proper time and resources to prepare a master plan can be very costly and critical to your church’s future.”

This, he says, is why a church with limited existing (or potential) property needs a good master plan: to maximize use of its site. Also, a church that’s rapidly growing needs the guidance of a master plan so the required facilities can be designed to sustain its growth. Likewise, a church with the potential for significant growth needs special assistance from the master plan so that its short-term facility development will mesh with its long-term growth requirements.

Before you get too far along in the process, don’t to be afraid to hire whatever team members you need to ensure you get excellent fact-finding information.

“Important issues don’t change in relation to size,” Chegwidden says. “Every decision you make depends on the quality of the information you gather.” Assessing the needs for a church and its associated school can be quite different, but thoroughly understanding each set — through proper information gathering — helps minimize difficulties.

The design of Perimeter Church in Duluth, Ga., reflects dual use of both interior and exterior space. CDH worked with church leaders to develop an educational wing on their campus for their academy to accommodate K-8 students. A large, commercial-grade kitchen and adjacent space functions as a weekday lunchroom, but also offers the church a secondary fellowship hall.

The soccer field, track and pool on the Perimeter campus serve dual purposes as well. During the school year, the fields and pool are used for the academy’s athletic activities whereas during the summer months, they play an integral role in the church’s weeklong summer camp, which routinely attracts about 5,000 children.

Many church leaders who plan for schools to eventually be extensions of their ministries opt for multipurpose buildings that serve as temporary worship centers, gyms and fellowship halls combined.

Surfaces for indoor gym space must be durable enough to handle the activity, but the typical painted block wall can create a challenge if the room is used for worship services. Acoustical treatments likely will be required.

Designers at CDH dealt with one such room for Johns Creek United Methodist Church in Duluth, Ga. To address both concerns, a split-face block was used as a wainscot. The irregular, porous surface of the block provided part of the solution for the acoustical requirements. The sound diffusion and absorbent quality needed for worship was accomplished with this surface, and the durability to function as a gymnasium was also considered.

Most church leaders are also charged with making a classroom work for both weekday school use and as a Sunday school space. This is accomplished with adequate, separate storage.

Additionally, most classrooms require dry-erase and bulletin boards for Sunday, as well as for weekday use. Neither group can feel like it’s “their” classroom if they must share these boards with the other.

No matter what your church’s vision for the future — whether it includes a mothers’-morning-out program, a weekday preschool or a fully graded academy — you must create the proper balance between programming, design, schedule and resources for it to be a successful project.

“Most of the unsuccessful journeys you’ve heard about started here — with a budget, a program, and a design that didn’t match,” Chegwidden writes in The Next Step. “Every successful journey requires four things: prayer, planning, preparation and resources. And traveling into unfamiliar or uncharted territory requires even more planning and preparation.”

Ernest Pullen is the director of creative services for CDH Partners, Inc. (www.cdhpartners.com) in Marietta, Ga. Reach him by calling 770.423.0016.

Toolbox

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