Bond Issues in Texas

We have just recently been through an election process in the State of Texas for funding school capital improvements. Most major building projects in the state are funded through local Independent School Districts (ISD) by issuing the sale of bonds. The bonds must be approved by the voters in the ISD in which they reside. There were a total of 43 ISD's with elections and 33 passed, a 76.7% passage rate. The total dollar amount of funding that was called was $835,360,000 and the total amount passed was $633,070,000. In ISD's with less than 5000 students, the number of bond issues called was 38 and 29 passed. Large ISD's with more than 5000 students, the number of bond issues called was 5 and 4 passed. Even in these difficult economic times, the need for improving school facilities continues. It is apparent that the majority of the voters in the state recognized the need and said yes to improving their local school facilities. State law will only allow bond elections to occur at standard election dates in May and November, so the next round of bonds will be coming during the national election. This may be a difficult time to get voters to say yes to increasing their taxes, time will tell. Michael D. King AIA

Energy Efficient Building Envelopes

With many areas having adopted the 2009 International Energy Conservation Code, there are new considerations being evaluated in wall construction. Many climates are required to have a layer of continuous insulation in their exterior walls to meet this code. If your schools are constructed using either metal studs or masonry, the insulation between the studs or in the cells of the masonry is not considered continuous and an additional layer must be added outside of this wall.

An alternative wall system gaining traction in some areas is ICF - Insulated Concrete Forms. This wall system uses two layers of foam that work both as the formwork for a concrete wall and for the layer of continuous insulation. The foam forms can easily be cut to place electrical conduit or small pipes. A masonry veneer can still be applied to the exterior face of the wall. The most common interior finish is gypsum board.

There are several benefits to this wall system. It has a higher R-value than other standard wall systems, thus making the envelope more energy efficient. It is also much faster to construct, which saves time and money during construction. ICF is also designed to be a load-bearing system, which eliminates the need for any structural beams and columns around the perimeter of the building, also a direct cost savings. A disadvantage of this system is the increased wall thickness, which is typically 1'-6". This increased wall thickness translates into a larger building footprint. However, even with this increase, the cost savings generated by the benefits listed above result in this wall system still being very comparable in $/SF to a masonry wall system.

School Design Standards

Education in the State of Texas is governed by the Texas Education Agency (TEA). The TEA adopted school facility design standards in 1994 and then updated and revised the standards in 2004. Essentially the standards set out minimum sizes of classrooms and other spaces for the grade levels. As an example, kindergarten and 1st grade classrooms are sized at a minimum of 800sf for 22 students. TEA has limited the class size of students in K - 4th grade at a 22 to 1 ratio. If you are in a smaller school district and you don't have 22 students per room, you can use the factor of 36sf per student to get to your minimum room size. I usually don't recommend using the square foot factor per student since it limits you to that number of students. If the class size grows you would have to add additional classrooms and teachers, rather than expanding into the rooms you have. Grade levels 2 - 12 are sized at 700sf per classroom and if smaller size rooms are appropriate, you would use the factor of 32sf in the lower grade levels and 28sf in the secondary level. TEA felt it was necessary to set the minimum standards and unfortunately this is the size rooms that we see end up being provided. These minimum sizes may meet your needs just fine, but in most cases we find that even these rooms are too small to meet the needs of teachers and the number of students that are squeezed into the space. It is imperative that you communicate to your design professional how many students are being planned for in the classrooms. Does an 800sf kindergarten room meet your needs in how you teach your curriculum? Only you can answer that question. If it is not discussed, you may end up with the classrooms being too small. I would be interested to know what other states have set out minimum design standards and how they compare.