UNSCHOOL COPENHAGEN

The world is facing a huge learning crisis. Education systems have become so generic and systemic that it doesn’t provide personal, innovative and optimized care to its pupils. While countries have significantly increased access to education, being in school isn’t the same thing as learning. Worldwide, hundreds of millions of children reach young adulthood without even the most basic skills like calculating the correct change from a transaction, reading a doctor’s instructions, or understanding a bus schedule—let alone building a fulfilling career or educating their children.

Education is at the center of building human capital. Delivered well, education – along with the human capital it generates – benefits individuals and societies. But Pedagogy faces a real test in today’s times for it has remained very stagnant and rigid in its discourse. One big reason the learning crisis persists is that many education systems across the developing world have little information on who is learning and who is not.

Schools are supposed to be the real ‘Innovation Incubators’ that shape children of the future. Schools ought to inspire wonder, creativity and innovation through teaching and learning. Schools should offer welcoming environments that instill confidence to pursue our dreams and interests. Schooling environment, since the industrial revolution has done very less to revamp their gloomy, isolated and lifeless spaces.

The competition seeks the creation of a ‘school for the future’ (age group 5-12) that completely negates the regularized building typology of existing ones. The competition seeks to radicalize the school system through architecture not only in terms of improving the quality of study environment but revamping the system and breaking all the physical and metaphorical class divisions into an entirely new school system. The participants should devise new pedagogical systems that would negate the generic teaching strategies and give more importance to personal interests and aspirations of the students. The competition seeks ideas from participants to create a fun environment for a middle school that understands the individual needs of each child yet being very collaborative in nature.

Honorable Mentions:

Seweryn Trzyna (Poland), Francesco Pulice (Italy), Ingmar Klappe (Netherlands), Ekin Erar, Zhiyi Chen (USA), Rohit Mankar (India), Carlos Chiver, Luis Lopez, Mariana Hernandez (Mexico), Maria Korneeva, Aliya Mirobdalova (Russia), Kim Hayeon, Ameesh, Hari Pulibandla (India), Robin Le Bourhis, Ben Stojanik (Ireland), Kim Haerim (South Korea)

https://switchcompetition.com/unschool-copenhagen-results/