Leading Change for Contemporary School Design

At Gratnells, our mission is to be more than just a provider of school storage; we aim to be a world leader in creating learning environments that improve educational outcomes. We recognise the important role that schools play in developing future leaders of learning and our Planning Learning Spaces in Practice framework is designed to work directly in partnership with schools to achieve this.

Terry White, Principal Education Advisor of Planning Learning Spaces in Practice, highlights the work of the PLSiP Team at a TEA talk “Design for Education” at Lancaster University October 2024. 

Terry outlines the need for a compelling and shared vision for change that can be translated into actions and observable behaviours that become an integral part of the design brief. He emphasises the importance of the need for the meaningful engagement of the school and all those within its community of learning in leading change.

The PLS team also contributed two chapters to the publication Design for Education: Spaces and Tools for Learning, edited by Ana Rute Costa and Rachel Cooper, published by Routledge, 2025. 

The importance of the need for the wider participation of architects, design professionals and supply chain members is explored in the longer version of the TEA talk to ensure innovative approaches are developed for the design of contemporary learning.

With thanks to Terry White, the Planning Learning Spaces in Practice team and Lancaster University