The sixth international DesignShare Awards program challenges world standards and offers models for more learner-centered, cost-efficient and sustainable learning environments. Co-sponsored by School Construction News and the C/S Group, this assemblage of 42 projects is not a fashion show - as presented at DesignShare.com, it's part of a comprehensive database of more than 300 best-practice case studies, and includes educator narratives, planning process summaries, construction data, photographs, floor and site plans. Ranging from early childhood centers to the university campus, the common ground is that each of the projects featured challenges current standards and shows a more effective solution.

The 2005 winning projects recognize five Honor, seven Merit Awards and ten Citation Awards - a selection from the 42 awarded projects published online at DesignShare.com. An international team of school and university planning and design experts selected the project submittals originating from Australia, Canada, Egypt, India, Israel, Netherlands, Singapore, Spain and the United States. Some highlights include:

• A river runs through it — nature as a unifying element

  While many campuses look like they were designed to serve the needs of cars, with "leftover space" for people, a more holistic vision is offered by the master plan for the University of Salamanca, Spain. The plan provides a framework for a walkable community, joining the commercial center of Villamayor and a new academic campus along the Tormes River, complete with an art garden, and botanical and scientific parks.

• More with less — blurring the lines between inside and outside

  School authorities that struggle to provide quality facilities at 150 square feet per student can take a lesson from the Paschalisschool in the Hague, Netherlands. The design blurs the line between indoor and outdoor spaces, classrooms and common areas, and creates a delightful environment with less than 100 square feet per student.

• Urban solutions — big schools, storybook learning gardens

  Singapore, with one of the densest school populations in the world, provides a model to balance large scale public areas, smaller reflective spaces, and play areas. The Zhangde Primary School elegantly steps between multi-story blocks and landscaped courts, creating learning gardens with a storybook appeal.

• A pattern for community-business partnerships and life-long learning

  Mawson Lakes, a new community near Adelaide, South Australia, integrates living, learning, working and play. Access to a wide range of educational services through university, civic and business partnerships is the key to this model of sustainable development.

The Review Process

The awards program is unique in many ways, one being that it focuses first on learning, second the learners, and then moves into how the built or natural environment provides rich learning opportunities. The uniqueness continues with the review process being virtual and conducted entirely via the Web.

The review interface includes the architects and educators narratives, facility data, products, plan diagram, and image summary from which we review, send comments to one another, and rate the projects - all anonymously. Names of projects, designers, planners and architects are withheld until after the ratings have been completed.

Applicants are asked to answer two questions. What exemplary ideas do the designs contain that enhance learning? What innovations in the planning, programming and design process supported the realization of those exemplary ideas?

Key principles include:

• Personalized Learning
• Social Interaction
• Real-World
• Community Involvement
• Accommodates Change
• Fosters Health and Security
• Technology enhancing
• Global Connections
• Sustainable, high-performance design

Randall Fielding, AIA, is the chairman and founding partner of Fielding Nair International, a school/university planning and design firm. He is also the editorial director and founder of DesignShare. He can be reached at fielding@designshare.com.