Shelter Industries installs modular kindergarten classrooms in British Columbia

Shelter Industries recently unveiled and started installing modular classrooms for British Columbia’s full-day kindergarten initiative.

The company is creating 138<0x000A>modular classrooms, as part of a $30-million contract with B.C.’s Ministry of Education.

The first units were recently installed in New Westminster.

The new classrooms are considerably different than typical school portables, which only had a 15-year lifespan.

“This is different,” said Education Minister Margaret MacDiarmid, during a tour of the prototype earlier this year.

“You can just tell by the feel of it.”

Designed to last up to 40 years, the structures are installed on permanent foundation and are designed to provide the same feel and comfort as any site-built structure.

Even classrooms installed on temporary foundations are intended to provide the warmth necessary to deal with a harsh winter in Northern B.C. and the comfort of air conditioning on a sweltering hot day in B.C.’s Okanagan.

Mary Polak, minister of Children and Family Development, also attended the tour of the prototype.

“You can’t even call these buildings a portable,” she said. “They are so night and day different.”

The classrooms are more spacious, with large functional windows, durable window roll shutters, security screens, high performance warm insulation (outside the framing), an energy-efficient HVAC system, wood exterior and interior finishing, and the infrastructure for full building services and computer technology.

They also meet the latest seismic safety standards.

“There is nothing like this anywhere else (in the province,” said MacDiarmid.

She added that it’s a great space for younger students.

The minister seemed happy with the decision to use modular units for the classrooms.

“This is a great way to have gone,” she said.

With enrolment growing in some areas and declining in others, modular classrooms can be moved or clustered should enrolment dictate change.

Polak said that modular buildings provide savings in time and labour.

The classrooms are constructed indoors, eliminating weather delays.

Also, building construction can move ahead without waiting for foundations to be poured.

In total, 25 school districts will see 138 modular classrooms installed at about 100 sites across the province by September 2011.

“I am quite confident that (parents and educators) are going to be quite pleased to receive (these modular classrooms),” said Polak.

Shelter Industries is a Greensmart Shelters company, which has created a number of schools, colleges and daycares since 1985 — including a 198-modular classroom project for Alberta’s Ministry of Education.

JOC NEWS SERVICE