‘Changing the Conversation about School Safety’ with Barry Svigals - Stanford d.school Spotlight

In this sixth episode of the Stanford d.school spotlight; Barry Svigals gives a peek of the thoughts around his book Changing the Conversation about School Safety. Published as a d.school guide. Read it here: https://issuu.com/stanforddschool/docs/changingtheconversationaboutschoolsafety-k12lab.

Can over-securing reduce feelings of enjoyment and senses of safety? How does might an obsession with safety present obstacles and challenges when designing learning environments and systems?

Barry Svigals offers a brave and bold approach to safety in schools from a unique and close perspective of school shootings and the following decision making. After all the safest place to learn would be a reinforced concrete padded box but we could imagine a-lot would be lost in such environments.

Design for our environments and systems should be a way that isn't static and involve those who best know the environment, people, and the dynamic of safety in the context of creating a learning environment that will enliven and delight students of all ages.

Barry' Svigals is an artist, architect, musician, keynote speaker and thought leader, Barry Svigals is helping communities and organizations become more creative and collaborative, making places that express who they are. Trained as both an artist and an architect, he wove those two worlds together in the founding of an architecture+art firm which he led for over 30 years.  Work, play, surprise, and fun are all part of the collective effort to infuse “making with meaning.” At the heart of it all is his passion to challenge his own creativity as well as the creativity of others in service of what is needed in the world. 

A graduate of Yale College and the Yale School of Architecture, Barry also studied sculpture at the École Nationale Supèrieure des Beaux Arts in Paris. Along the way he enjoyed another kind of education playing rock and roll in with a band that still plays today. All of that contributed to a long list of projects for diverse clients, among them major universities such as Yale, Boston College and the University of Connecticut as well as major corporations and institutions such PepsiCo and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Residential clients included Keith Richards and Patti Hansen as well as Garry Trudeau and Jane Pauley. The firm’s best known project is the Sandy Hook School in Newtown, Connecticut completed in 2016.

In addition to speaking engagements, Barry is currently preparing for an exhibition of his paintings in Italy in spring 2020 and is working on a book, How We Are Matters, which will be published in late 2019.

Hosted by The Learning Future’s very own Louka Parry, indulge your cortex in some modern thinking at the forefront of educational design with our amazing guest.

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