Redesigning High School Cafeterias

Design Challenge Brief

The challenge is to redesign your high school cafeteria with both indoor and outdoor seating areas, creating spaces and options that encourage healthy eating.  You may redesign the interior of the existing cafeteria space, expand on the existing space, or design a completely new addition on to your school building.

Your design should contain all the spaces and functions required for a typical school cafeteria – a variety of seating options for students, as well as kitchen with food prep, storage, serving, and clean up areas.  The redesigned cafeteria should include outdoor access for student seating, as well as food deliveries and waste.  You should also consider sustainability issues and the environmental impact of your design.

via discoverdesign.org

I love the intent of the program (sponsored by the Chicago Architecture Foundation) and I wonder if a typical student knows enough about a kitchen — much less a commercial kitchen — to critique and redesign one? Familiar-enough with the distinctions which might be needed (I have no idea, personally) if modifying a kitchen to use more vegetables? (I assume that fresh vegetables are more sustainable than whatever else is found in most high school kitchens.) About storage and prep space? I can understand that students may have useful perceptions about the public areas — seating and so forth. But the behind-the-scene spaces? Well I don't know — and that is a sincere question. It will be interesting to follow the results in later this year.