AROUND THE PITCH-Community Centered African Schools

Project idea

This project is located in Kachitu, Zambia, with the aim of establishing a five-year boarding secondary school capable of accommodating 250 to 400 students. Emphasizing community co-creation and shared development, we deeply integrate the educational environment with the local social ecology to foster a sustainable nurturing setting. Open corridors, multi-level courtyards, and public activity zones form a symbiotic "school-community" network. The entire campus centers around a football field as the main visual element, with radiating branch-like walkways extending outward to connect various functional areas, creating a "tree-vascular" road system. Surrounding the football field, the internal corridors develop into diverse usage spaces, such as reading zones, spectator stands, trellis landscape areas, and outdoor assembly spaces that are periodically open to the public, establishing interaction hubs for teachers, students, and the community.

Project description

The project is located in the Kachitu region of Zambia, serving a community within an 18,000-person radius and eight local primary schools, annually graduating over 1,000 students. The total land area covers seven hectares, with planned construction indicators including a total indoor building area of 7,295 square meters and a building footprint of 9,976.25 square meters.
In terms of functional layout, the project features standardized teaching zones equipped with 432 seats arranged in nine modular units accommodating 48 students each, three laboratories, and two practical training workshops. The residential area comprises 60 dormitories (four blocks with 15 rooms each), providing a total of 480 beds (eight per room). Adjacent to male and female dormitories are standalone toilets, bathrooms, and changing rooms. The site also includes a transportation system with 12 parking spaces.
Additional facilities encompass a cafeteria with a kitchen, teachers' offices, a medical clinic with a doctor's office, a security building with a reception desk, honey harvesting and beekeeping education units, a multifunctional assembly hall, outdoor activity zones, a standard football field, a student recreation park featuring benches and a vine-covered landscape area, as well as a radial pedestrian pathway system connecting to a central courtyard.

Technical information

This project employs a framework structure, utilizing wooden truss and steel truss systems, achieving dual optimization of functionality and ecology through differentiated design.
Functions such as teaching, practice, accommodation, and corridors are constructed with a framework system comprising 500×500mm reinforced concrete columns and 300×600mm beams. Overhanging eaves extending beyond 1 meter are supported by 150×150mm wooden columns. For multi-purpose assembly halls with spans of 15 meters or more, a lightweight steel truss structure is applied, with only external walls featuring 500×500mm reinforced concrete columns to create column-free spaces suitable for gatherings.
The enclosure system employs 290×140mm ICEB block walls, forming a passive thermal barrier through a 290mm composite wall thickness combined with an air insulation layer. The project relies on a 90% utilization rate of local materials and a hybrid supply model for external steel trusses, integrating local technical expertise to establish a low-technology, low-carbon footprint regional construction paradigm.