Post Occupancy Evaluation of School Refurbishment Projects: Multiple Case Study in the UK

Ahmed, Hamad and Edwards, D.J. and Lai, Joseph H. K. and Roberts, Chris and Debrah, Caleb and Owusu-Manu, De-Graft and Thwala, Wellington Didibhuku (2021) Post Occupancy Evaluation of School Refurbishment Projects: Multiple Case Study in the UK. Buildings, 11 (4). p. 169. ISSN 2075-5309

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Abstract

Buildings inevitably deteriorate with time. Schools buildings are no exception and require refurbishment at times. Despite the UK Government announcing the £1 billion funding for rebuilding 50 schools over 10 years starting 2010–2021, it is common practice for builders and designers to, upon completion of a building project, move on to the next development without considering how the completed building performs. This research undertakes a post occupancy evaluation (POE) of three schools in the West Midlands, UK with specific focus on building services, viz., heating, lighting, and air conditioning and ventilation. The research adopted a mixed philosophical approach of interpretivism and post-positivism to conduct inductive reasoning. A questionnaire that collected both quantitative and qualitative primary data was distributed to the end-users of the schools. Data was analysed using the Cronbach’s alpha, one sample t-test and Kruskal–Wallis test to identify any differences between the questionnaire responses. Findings revealed that building users demanded greater control of the internal environment thus contradicting the current trend for automated ‘intelligent systems’ approaches. This research represents the first work to consider the contractor’s perspective towards developing a better understanding of client satisfaction with the school buildings. Moreover, the POE result represents a notable pragmatic advancement to knowledge that will influence the contractor’s knowledge and understanding of client satisfaction, and where to improve upon these.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	** From MDPI via Jisc Publications Router ** History: accepted 09-04-2021; pub-electronic 16-04-2021. ** Licence for this article: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Identification Number:	https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings11040169
Dates:	Date Event 9 April 2021 Accepted 16 April 2021 Published Online
Uncontrolled Keywords:	building services, construction, POE, refurbishment, schools, soft landings
Subjects:	CAH13 - architecture, building and planning > CAH13-01 - architecture, building and planning > CAH13-01-02 - building
Divisions:	Faculty of Computing, Engineering and the Built Environment > School of Engineering and the Built Environment
SWORD Depositor:	JISC PubRouter
Depositing User:	JISC PubRouter
Date Deposited:	19 Apr 2021 10:18
Last Modified:	12 Jan 2022 13:25
URI:	https://www.open-access.bcu.ac.uk/id/eprint/11546

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