Casa Blanca Community School

The flat site is located on Tribal Lands, surrounded by semi-arid landscape in a desert climate. Surrounded by cultivated farmland, the area has historically been a hub for the community’s Akimel O’otham (Pima) and Pee Posh (Maricopa) peoples. Casa Blanca Community School is the second school where the GRIC has worked under a unique arrangement with the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) that enables the community to take initiative in replacement of physically and educationally substandard BIA facility and to assert control over the planning, visioning, programming, design and project delivery.

The school has a (traditional and culturally appropriate) east-facing entry. The campus layout takes inspiration from the agricultural fields that sustained the community and the canals they were so skilled in devising. Utilizing a village-inspired organization, the campus faces inwards. Buildings surround a central green space that opens to a series of smaller outdoor rooms that provided places for learning, gathering and play. Common and core area destinations feature wooden structures with butterfly rooves and clerestory windows. Ocotillo-like features include artwork and benches to create places of welcome at the entrance and each classroom cluster.

The school is expected to receive LEED Silver certification. Walkways with deep overhangs ring each courtyard, providing shade, shelter and indirect light to all classrooms. Occuli at key intersections create moving shadows and openings that frame the sky above. Solar tubes in all classrooms supplement and minimize the need for indoor lighting. Strategies to diminish the project’s environmental impact included: native plantings, minimal lawn, local materials, integrated water conservation and storm water management measures.