Youth education center in Baltimore gets first students

The Jean and Sidney Silber Center, a joint project of Building Design+Construction, the U.S. Green Building Council, and Parks & People Foundation, was officially dedicated June 14 in a ceremony at Druid Hill Park, Baltimore.

The modular structure will serve as a training center for “Branches,” Parks & People’s internship and summer jobs program for Baltimore youth ages 14 to 21. Students learn environmental skills, natural resource management, urban agriculture, and water quality monitoring.

“I even learned how to raise rainbow trout in the classroom,” said high school student Khyja McCray, a Branches intern.

Branches interns Zion Smith, Khyja McCray with Branches team leader Blake Wrigley.

The 600-sf structure was designed by Ziger/Snead Architects, with Morgan State University’s Architecture Department. It was built by Modular Genius. Consulting firm Synthesis completed final installation.

Product contributions and financial support were provided by Access Lighting, Chicago Faucets, Dow Corning, LaCantina Doors, LG, MechoSystems, Modular Building Institute, nora Systems, Valspar, and Zola European Windows. Mark Line Industries produced the metal cladding.

The Silber Center is fitted with a kitchen.

The Jean and Sidney Silber Foundation provided additional funding. BD+C exhibited the structure at Greenbuild 2015, in Washington, D.C.

LPA Architects conducted a post-occupancy evaluation, or POE, of the eSTEM Academy, a new high school specializing in health/medical and design/engineering Career Technical Education, in Eastvale, Calif. The POE helped LPA, the Riverside County Office of Education, and the Corona-Norco Unified School District gain a better understanding of which design innovations—such as movable walls, flex furniture, collaborative spaces, indoor-outdoor activity areas, and a student union—enhanced the education program, and how well students and teachers used these innovations.

Resiliency | Jun 24, 2021

Oceanographer John Englander talks resiliency and buildings [new on HorizonTV]

New on HorizonTV, oceanographer John Englander discusses his latest book, which warns that, regardless of resilience efforts, sea levels will rise by meters in the coming decades. Adaptation, he says, is the key to future building design and construction.