Research underscores the return-on-investment for creating a variety of spaces on school campuses — inside and out — that allow students, faculty and staff to replenish and recharge their mind, body and spirit.
As we emerge from the COVID pandemic, students and educators are stressed out. From preschool to university campuses, anxiety and mental health issues are creating a barrier to academic performance, teacher retention and student health.
Design can play a critical role in relieving stress, creating environments that take a proactive approach to promoting well-being on campus. Research is increasingly helping designers understand the range of human needs, supporting an evidence-based approach to developing spaces to support wellness for a wide range of individuals.
“Designing for wellness should focus on providing choice,” says LPA Director of Programming, Winston Bao, “and offering complementary indoor and outdoor environments working together to create an ecosystem of wellness.”
The new Los Medanos College facility combines the student union with a kinesiology, athletics and recreation complex to provide a fitness center for all students.
Wellness is integrated into the core of every LPA campus design. From the start of the process, designers work to create a web of indoor and outdoor spaces to help students become their best selves, while addressing the larger campus goals. In the integrated approach, landscape architects and interior designers are involved from the outset to develop spaces that accommodate all learning styles, activity levels and personality types to promote overall mental, physical and emotional wellness.
“The most successful projects are when the landscape, the architecture and the interiors are all contributing to the same concept or story,” LPA Director of Landscape Architecture, Rich Bienvenu says.
Promoting wellness is about the “active pursuit of activities, choices and lifestyles that lead to a state of holistic health [and well-being].
An Evidence-Based Approach Multidisciplinary research in recent years has highlighted the connection between the many dimensions of wellness and the built environment, as well as the return-on-investment for making wellness a central goal of a design. Studies show that students’ health, wellness and ability to learn are significantly impacted by their physical, social, and cultural environments. Natural spaces have been shown to provide immense psychological benefits, helping mitigate anxiety and stress while improving attention, engagement, focus and cognitive functioning.
Even before the COVID pandemic, campuses were focusing more on the positive impacts of wellness strategies. That said, the pandemic ramped up stress levels, and may have led to meaningful change in attitudes toward wellness. “The pandemic took away the stigma in talking about stress or anxiety,” says LPA Project Manager, Jomay Liao. “It put a new spotlight on the importance of spaces and facilities supporting wellness.”
Students are saying loud and clear they need help. The 2022 State of Student Mental Wellness California Report by ACLU found that 63% of students reported an emotional meltdown, 43% of students reported a panic or anxiety attack, and 22% of students reported three or more days where they could not participate in school because of mental health. In a poll of California State University, Dominguez Hills students conducted by LPA for a new health, wellness and recreation center, 64% said emotional wellness was a top challenge for their academic advancement; 69% expressed an interest in stress-management programs. More respondents expressed the need for a place to relax (71%) rather than just a place to exercise (60%).
“There are consistent takeaways from the studies,” LPA Research Manager, Kimari Phillips says. “Students and staff are challenged by anxiety, depression and a wide range of physical and social environmental factors affecting their campus life.”
On university campuses, LPA designers have expanded the definition of recreation centers and student unions to address the mind, body and spirit, guided by research and discussions with educators and students, who overwhelmingly identified wellness as a top priority. More than simply places to congregate and study, the facilities include wellness centers to give students a safe space to deescalate after a conflict and to practice mindfulness throughout their busy day. They also connect students to services and resources, from counseling to food pantries, to meet basic needs and support their overall well-being.
For Los Medanos College, the student union was combined with a kinesiology, athletics and recreation complex to provide a fitness center for all students and support whole student wellness. The approach integrated healthy living into the fabric of the campus and broke down barriers between departments and demographics.
To make a difference, wellness can’t be about a single facility. Effective design strategies require an attitude that every environment can connect to the larger wellness goal. Everyone must be able to find a space that they’re comfortable in.
A pre-design survey of students at Menchaca Elementary School in Austin, Texas, found access to daylight was a top priority.
“Truly designing for the whole student is about integrating health-promoting spaces throughout a campus,” Liao says. “If we want to accommodate a variety of people and personalities and preferences, it can’t come from any one space. It comes from a variety of environments.”
Research conducted by a wide variety of institutions over the years helps provide clear guidelines and targets for wellness design, LPA’s research team found. The research has identified eight dimensions of wellness: spiritual, intellectual, emotional, physical, occupational, environmental, social and financial. Designing to promote wellness, indoors and outdoors, focuses on three types of spaces — quiet places to be away, alone or in private conversation; places to feel like you belong, for personalization and collaboration; and places to nourish the mind and spirit.
To address these elements across an inclusive spectrum of individuals requires spaces that support different levels of activity and different levels of privacy. Students of different ages are at very different developmental stages and require design strategies to match their needs.
Based on the data, LPA focuses its wellness design strategies around three key areas.
Often, with too much open space, occupants are stripped of the opportunity to decide whether, when and how long they want to engage with others. This lack of control over interactions will intuitively discourage occupants from using the space.
Inclusive, Universal Design To truly promote social, emotional and cognitive well-being, spaces need to promote inclusion, connection and a sense of belonging. Whenever possible, it’s essential to engage students and educators early in the process to understand their specific needs and prioritize environments that can be accessed equitably. That means embracing universal and barrier-free design principles for people of all mobilities, as well as neurodiverse users.
“There is no one-size-fits-all solution,” Bao says. “It takes thoughtful effort to consider those frequently left out of the design process.”
Welcoming, comfortable spaces develop students’ sense of belonging and engagement. Easy navigation, hazard-proof spaces and accommodations for individual differences and disabilities can reduce anxiety and create a sense of safety, belonging and ownership.
Inclusion can take many forms. For Menchaca Elementary School in Austin, Texas, a predesign survey found 43% of students in the existing school said they didn’t have access to daylight. Providing an environment that offered more students access to natural daylight, views to nature and a connection to the outdoors became a primary wellness goal. (In a post-occupancy evaluation of the new campus, 97% of the respondents said they were satisfied or very satisfied with direct views to nature and access to natural daylight.)
For Palomar College, an office building was reimagined as an active campus with wide staircases.
Active Design Evidence-based design solutions encourage movement and promote physical activity. The results include reduced anxiety and depression symptoms, lower aggression levels and an overall decrease in health risk, studies show.
Spaces can promote the natural inclination to move, play and explore as part of school routine. Flexible, adjustable and movable furniture keeps students active. Storage for play and fitness equipment increases opportunities for health-promoting physical activity.
For Palomar College, LPA designers transformed an office building into active campus for one of the education centers. Wide staircases on either end of the four-story building act as vertical circulation beacons and keep students moving to activities on different levels. On the campus of Tarbut v’Torah Community Day School, slides provide a fun way for upper-school students to connect with the campus lower level.
Outdoor spaces can be designed to support specific styles of activity, from structured and unstructured play to different sizes of group activities. Large spaces can invite exploration; smaller group spaces can offer flexibility in casual seating arrangements that allow movement within groups.
“It’s not just creating this physical space for wellness when we do PE areas or sports fields,” says LPA landscape project designer, Danielle Cleveland. “We’re trying to provide a variety of spaces that allow for each type of activity level, ensuring there is a space where every student can benefit from physical exercise.”
Outdoor spaces can be programmed to support a wide range of activities.
Biophilic Design Creating connections to nature, indoors and outdoors, provides direct benefits for students and educators, studies show. Biophilic design addresses our innate emotional and biological affiliation to other living organisms and our desire for connection with nature.
Research has demonstrated that biophilia can play a key role in improving physiological responses to environmental stressors and reducing recovery time after exposure to those stressors.
The connection to nature can be visual, multisensory, active or passive. Spaces for nature-based activities and gardening create hands-on experiences and impact attention, focus and a sense of pride. Indoors, a variety of materials, textures and patterns and a range of spaces can help make students feel more comfortable and healthier. More natural and authentic materials will produce positive outcomes, studies show. For example, human receptors can distinguish the difference between synthetic and natural wood.
“Young children learn through play and their tactile experiences,” Bao says.
Exposure to daylight, views to the outside world and green space provide a wide variety of specific benefits, including eye rest from focused activity, attention restoration and quicker recovery from stress, studies show. In addition, biophilic design and the connection to nature help improve perceptions of safety and comfort, which helps students’ overall well-being and health.
Connections to outdoor spaces and nature can play a key role in improving physiological responses to environmental stressors, research shows.
A Wellness Blueprint There is no template for improving wellness on campus; there’s no one-size-fits all. Every campus is different. As districts invest in more counselors, psychologists and mental health programs, it is critical to include the physical environment in the wellness strategy. Research makes it clear that designing spaces for different needs can play an important role in relieving stress and making everyone feel like they belong.
“Wellness is about getting back to the core of what we need: safety and shelter, and a sense of connection — to nature and to each other,” Bienvenu says.
Maximizing the Value of Outdoor Spaces
Outdoor environments expand the opportunities for students to grow in ways not possible within a traditional classroom. Fresh air, sunlight, a visual or physical connection to nature and a variety of experiences allow students to explore and learn in and from their exterior surroundings. Natural spaces also reduce student and faculty stress, improve focus and promote emotional and physical health, according to a study published in the Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning in 2019.
“When we program exterior space like we would approach programming for interior space, we can increase the usable square footage while supporting larger wellness goals,” LPA landscape project designer Danielle Cleveland says. Outdoor spaces can be designed to support the mind, body and spirit in different ways, such as providing quiet spaces or small group spaces that increase comfort levels in introverted students and help kids recharge and unwind, or large outdoor classroom and gathering spaces where kids can come together, share ideas and socialize. “We look to provide a variety of spaces to address different needs, depending on the developmental stage, learning style, activity level and personality of the students,” Cleveland says.
Outdoor spaces are an important part of any campus wellness strategy.
Research has linked the lack of time outdoors — “nature deficit disorder” — to increased rates of depression, a lower ability to handle stress, and decreased academic performance and physical health. “We know that all of these issues affecting our kids are from a lack of being outdoors and that time outside can help,” Cleveland says.
Green spaces can also help the school’s economic bottom line. A 2022 study commissioned by the Trust for Public Land found, over a 20-year period, a green schoolyard’s cumulative net cost was 381% less than a gray, paved schoolyard. The prototypical green schoolyard yields net benefits related to increased student attendance, improved academic performance and staff retention, as well as savings in reduced energy costs, due to shading and wind buffers, the study found.
Gray schoolyards had a moderately lower initial renovation cost ($2.3 million compared to $2.6 million for green schoolyards), but they “yielded no benefits over time, with schools continuing to sink money into resealing asphalt,” the study found.
“School administrators can feel confident that every dollar invested in trees and replacing asphalt with natural green spaces will pay itself back four times over,” says Guillermo Rodriguez, California State Director and Vice President–Pacific Region for the Trust for Public Land.
