Campus Improvements
Maintaining Shady Hill's Campus
- The home for our curriculum
Since Shady Hill’s founding, the inclusion of music, dance, art, shop and physical education have been central elements of the school’s curriculum. Blueprints for Learning has reconfigured, renewed and rebuilt our arts and gym facilities. The decaying facilities that inadequately supported our curriculum before have been replaced with thoughtfully designed buildings to compliment and support our full range of programs.
Subscribe to our RSS photo feed will keep you up to date with the most current progress as it becomes available.
To maintain Shady Hill’s unique campus and approach to learning, the school raised $10,000,000 toward the cost of reconstructing the gym, arts classrooms and other facilities improvements.
Below are the facilities and campus improvements
that Blueprints for Learning has addressed.
1. ARTS FACILITIES
The new arts buildings have replaced classrooms that were built in the fifties and were in need of repair/replacement. The completed projects include:
- Two-studio visual arts building
- New shop building for lower and middle school woodshop
- New two-story building that houses music and expanded arts offerings
- Courtyard that serves as an outdoor classroom
2. GYM
The new gym replaced the aging facility that was inadequate for our current athletic program. It created the needed flexibility in the overall school schedule, which benefits the entire academic program. The new facility:
- Houses three full size courts (previously there were two)
- Allows the school’s athletic program to effectively serve 500 students
- Provides enhanced community gathering space for assemblies
3. OTHER CAMPUS IMPROVEMENTS
The spaces in which faculty teach and the campus paths on which students traverse from class to class – from four to fourteen – plays a much larger role than most institutions. Shady Hill’s seventeen child-scaled buildings serve as containers for the school’s unique academic program. In several ways, the campus is both a classroom and a teacher to all of us. Examples of this are the science courses that are taught outdoors, bird watching and gardening. Just as it was our responsibility to rebuild facilities that were in need of repair, it was also our responsibility to steward the campus and its needs as determined by the Board of Overseers. Other projects completed include:
- Underground parking facility (50 spaces) for faculty and staff
- Re-oriention of the west entrance to the campus
- Restoration of the wetlands with an increased footprint and functional pedestrian path (Gift from the Class of 2006) and drop-off area.
“Campus as Classroom -The school’s grounds support the primacy of exploration and discovery by allowing children and teachers the flexibility to use, reinvent, explore, and experiment with them. Shady Hill buildings and grounds promote contact with primary sources and actual materials: plants, dirt, sand, sun and air. By employing visible construction techniques, the buildings are didactic. The playing fields are maintained at a level appropriate for competitive play. The educative use of the campus takes priority over beautification.”
- From the Shady Hill’s Campus Vision Statement
“[Shady Hill School] creates a safe environment that allows children to be curious, take risks and make mistakes.
[Shady Hill School] helps children discover the power of imagination.
[Shady Hill School] encourages children to be independent thinkers and doers.”
-From Shady Hill’s Mission Statement
