BMAC students take on task of designing new school

Imagine designing a building you will never get to use. Picking out the design, choosing the materials, and selecting the colors. A group of B. McDaniel Intermediate students recently did just that by participating with the architecture firm Corgan and the Denison ISD leadership team in the beginning stages of the design process for Denison ISD’s new fifth and sixth grade campus. The new school will see its completion well after these students have moved on to the next phase of their education.

B. McDaniel fifth graders Emerson Evans, Evyn Eleby, Brendon Pilcher, Paisley Mitchell, Sailor Bock-Marney and sixth graders Braedy Adams, Trinity Knottingham, Luke Hall, Camilla Pilcher and Madden Means worked directly with the Corgan team to identify particular design elements regarding useable spaces, outdoor learning areas, choices of textures and color schemes. They were given a multitude of photographs, markers and glue sticks to create idea boards on how they best see the new school plan serving future students. The group had strong opinions on what they feel the new school will need and look forward to seeing the end result.

“First of all, I was like, oh, wow, this is actually really cool. And then second, well, wait, do they want my opinion on how the teachers should act and how, like, the overall feeling should be or the actual structural design?” Trinity said.

The energy in the room was quite evident as the group began to see examples of what the new campus might look like and what sort of amenities could be incorporated into the design.

“Bigger and better gyms. I love sports and I love courtyards and being outside and, like, doing other stuff than just sitting in a classroom. I want to see what role I've played and how they took our ideas, and what they did with our ideas,” Braedy said.

The group of students listened intently to the instructions they were given and took their role in the process very seriously. Some even chose to interview others in their preparation for the meeting.

“I was excited, so I started like talking to other people because I know there were only 10 people going to be able to do this. So, I asked other people and made some notes on what they would like,” Camilla said.

Even though they will be older and at a different school, she knows this process will create a new and special space for the next generation of Denison ISD school children.

“I would rather help make a better learning space for those who are in the grades that are going there in the future. I would rather make a better future,” Pilcher said.

B. McDaniel students used black and yellow flags to vote on design elements as a part of the exploration process in designing the new campus facility for Denison ISD fifth and sixth graders.

Corgan Architecture’s Grace Pettijohn worked directly with students to help them understand the aspect of building idea boards to help visualize the future campus design.

The students selected to be a part of the design stage of planning the new Denison ISD intermediate campus shared their thoughts on what they feel are important aspects of the school like the library, the computer labs, the gyms and the cafeteria.

Students worked in teams to explore design ideas for the new B. McDaniel campus to be constructed by Denison ISD. Teams then shared their thoughts with the architects from Corgan and DISD administrators to provide their perspective on what features they feel would best benefit future students.