The “Study Studio” is the new high school classroom. Will the teacher accept this concept?

Social studies teacher Gregg Solkovits remembers a few years ago at Monroe High in the San Fernando Valley, an unfortunate campus wanderer who treks from classroom to classroom, dragging teaching materials and surrounding personal artifacts because he has no room to call his own.

Some teachers had to do this – because Los Angeles schools in the 1990s and 2000s were overcrowded, not all middle school teachers could have their own rooms.

But now, his ordeal (renewed and redefined) is being used as a teaching innovation.

The new Compton High School, which will open this fall, is a pinnacle example: teachers will not have their own classrooms, but will host classes in various spaces based on topics and availability. The high-tech classroom itself was renamed the “Learning Studio” and its functions are the same as that of a university lecture hall.

“The focus here is to create a very flexible and adaptable space,” said Alenoush Aghajanians, who served as the design leader for Compton High at DLR Group Construction, as she described the functionality of a classroom.

“So all these tables and chairs are removable and there are rope tracks on the ceiling so they can access the power in whatever configuration they need,” she said. “We created a space that will have a good projection screen. So students will have the ability to project and then patch it up – all these whiteboards are their space “Ding Ding Dangdang” Just like when they code. In the real world, students will have the infrastructure to work like an office space. ”

Compton High School principal Larry Natividad had to run his school on an old surplus middle school campus during construction, and he was ready to embrace the concept.

“It’s like a college environment,” he said. “So, when students go to college, they may thrive.”

When not leading the course, teachers will have desks, computers and limited storage space in a compact “collaboration room”.

Technology makes this concept feasible – students are reading, taking exams and completing work, and even online many projects. In theory, teachers should have much less everywhere, unlike Solkovitz on that day. Not to mention that Solkovits has to deal with narrow corridors and unqualified classrooms.

Compton High School’s classrooms are spacious and designed to face large glass panes both outdoors and in the interior hallways.

Some teachers always spin from the class and do a good job – for example, think of basic music teachers. (Compton High offers music teachers a glittering center for performing arts.)

Compton Teachers Union President Kristen Luevanos said school district leaders should be commended for bringing ideas, plans and resources to the area, but there is a history of new things with few warnings, too little teacher training and too little teacher investment.

“How will this work with teachers who can’t sell activity issues in every period?” she said. “How it will be used with the walls because they are all glasses – if you want a wealthy printing environment,” she said, referring to the surrounding students who use the printing words, including on the walls, such as excerpts from their own works and other works.

She hopes teachers invite (paid) to work through questions during the summer so that the school can start the strongest start when the school year begins in August.

Some teachers are completely skeptical of the concept of Roving.

“No. There’s no way,” said Nicolle Fefferman, a long-unified high school teacher and Los Angeles-area parents. “As a teacher, I built a physical space that reflects who I am, who my students are, what I know about our content, what we know about our school community… The foundation of public education is to build relationships and we need our physical space to reflect that value. Sterile spaces can be suitable for shopping and hotel lobbying.”

An example of Fefferman’s point is the South LA classroom of Dorsey High Advanced Placement African American studies teacher Donald Singleton, which is decorated with African flags, dolls in colorful African clothes and a wall of fame that includes pictures of Thurgood Marshall, Wilma Rudolph and Colin Powell — a visceral setting within which Singleton and his students wade into the nation’s debate over Black history and race.

But Compton High School is new and beautiful, and the family is calling for joining – the leaders of the Teachers Union hope that the new concept works for students.

“Innovation is great, the concept is really interesting, and I personally like it a little – but there are still many questions to answer,” Luivanos said.