Let Kids Be Kids: Reimagining Safety and Belonging in School Design
Join us for the launch of Let Kids Be Kids, a new engagement tool from the American Institute of Architects (AIA) that asks a deceptively simple question: what does it mean for a school to be truly safe and welcoming? Informed by a decade of research led by the AIA-CAE (Committee on Architecture for Education) Research Subcommittee and Safe Schools Working Group, Let Kids Be Kids draws on interdisciplinary research, design practice, and, most importantly, student experience to confront urgent questions of safety, mental health, community, and design justice in schools. This session is a call for all those who play a role in shaping the environments where children learn and grow. Using a circular learning model, participants will work in small, rotating groups to engage directly with the publication's most provocative questions and will leave with new tools for designing and advocating for safer, more welcoming schools. Above all, Let Kids Be Kids is an invitation to reimagine schools and rethink the communities around them as places where belonging blooms and children thrive.
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