Cherry Valley and Constance Lane Elementary Schools

Unleashing limitless learning

Client: Rockford Public Schools
Location: Rockford, Illinois, United States
Size: 86,000 square feet
Status: Completed

The K-5 years of a child’s life are vital to physical, intellectual, and social-emotional development. Seeking to maximize these growth opportunities, Rockford Public Schools challenged us to redefine the learning experience with a new K-5 school prototype. The prototype introduces an experiential, community-oriented approach to learning that inspires students to make, dream, imagine and expand their understanding of the world. It’s guided the creation of two, nearly identical schools: Cherry Valley Elementary School and Constance Lane Elementary School.

Power to the kids

Whereas children often have little say or power when it comes to making decisions, we challenged this dynamic and designed with students rather than for them. We provided their tools of choice—Crayola markers and Legos—and the students put their creativity to work. They imagined a future school that created friendships, promoted community, nurtured imaginations and unleashed limitless learning. Their vision became our vision for the project.

Each of the schools is broken down into smaller, identifiable masses to make it easier for students to navigate the building and understand their place within it.

Rockford Public Schools 12 — Each of the schools is broken down into smaller, identifiable masses to make it easier for students to navigate the building and understand their place within it.

We designed the schools to function as communities by breaking the grades into neighborhoods and designing each around the needs of the individual student groups. For example, to decrease the anxiety many kindergartners face when they start school, we placed their neighborhood at the front of the school, visible from the street and designed to function much like a one-room schoolhouse. The windows installed near floor level are irresistible to the students, beckoning them to engage with the world around them.

Each space has unique geometric windows with different colors that break the scale of the school down to the one-room schoolhouse, allowing kindergarten students to understand their space in the larger community.

Rockford Public Schools 7 — Each space has unique geometric windows with different colors that break the scale of the school down to the one-room schoolhouse, allowing kindergarten students to understand their space in the larger community.

Rockford Elementary — Each space has unique geometric windows with different colors that break the scale of the school down to the one-room schoolhouse, allowing kindergarten students to understand their space in the larger community.

The heart of each school is the town hall. Every student’s day starts and ends in this area, and all the social areas—the gym, cafeteria, library—surround it. Learning spaces are designed similarly, with grade-level classrooms surrounding shared social hubs that bring students together and give them ultimate flexibility in how they learn.

Every morning, the schools hold morning briefings in the town hall to help students release any negative energy they may hold, so they can best take in new information and collaborate with peers throughout the day.

Rockford Public Schools 15 — Every morning, the schools hold morning briefings in the town hall to help students release any negative energy they may hold, so they can best take in new information and collaborate with peers throughout the day.

Geometric shapes are found throughout the building to encourage play.

With integrated geometric furniture, students are able to learn about mass and void relationships in the physical world.

The space allows us to teach students how to be that 21st century learner, thinker and worker. We’re all here together, we’re in this together, we can do this.

Carolynn Timm Principal, Cherry Valley Elementary School

Since opening, teachers have shared that they’re able to work together in new ways and try lessons that weren’t possible in their previous classrooms. Students have beamed with excitement for everything from the gym (which has been described as the perfect setting for dodgeball), to the flexible furniture and the ways their experiences are helping them become more independent.