A school in Burkina Faso that becomes a civic centre

One of the most recent actions of the Ministry of Education of Burkina Faso has been to unify small isolated schools into large school complexes where education is provided from kindergarten to high school, in order to prevent early school leaving in the country. The new Bangre Veenem school centre designed by Albertfaus Architecture in the village of Koudougou and built by the Luxembourg-based NGO Le Soleil Dans la Main and the local city council is one of them. More than 8 hectares of land were available for the development of the project. The first choice of the designers was to reduce the intervention area by 40% in order to have as little impact as possible on the farmland of the community and therefore to organize it into two distinct parts: to the North the secondary school, the central administration and the parking lots, while to the South the kindergarten, canteen and auxiliary areas. A large public square divides the two areas in the centre, both to access the place and for transit, preventing a single fence from becoming a barrier inside the village.

The pavilions are concentrated near this central axis and are also distributed according to the significant natural heritage of the area: centuries-old trees, called Néré in the local language that protects you from sun and rain. Walls and vaults made of compressed earth bricks for the school pavilions together with thick stone walls used for services are surmounted by powerful corrugated sheet metal roofs that protect them, forming the architectural language that characterizes and makes the entire intervention recognizable. Numerous trees will be planted around the pavilions to provide natural shade, reduce temperature and  dust, as well as the pergolas, car parks and the fence will be shaded by luxuriant Bougainvillea. This will be possible for the next rainy season, meanwhile, students and bicycles will find shelter under the great Néré.