The school of joy - school in dinajpur earning international aga khan architectural award

The school of joy
Faizul Khan Tanim returns from Dinajpur fascinated by the architecture of the premises of METI School, which is considered a breakthrough in architectural design and is also inspiring the villagers in future development
photos by Anna Heringer/Khandakar Hasibul Kabir

The nine projects that won the prestigious 2007 Aga Khan Award for Architecture ranges from a sustainable residential tower in Singapore to a village school hand-built by local craftspeople in Dinajpur. Built in four months by members of the local community and volunteer architects from Germany and Austria, the school makes use of easily available local materials like mud, straw and bamboo to create a new model that is being touted as an architectural feat.
The first sight of METI (modern education and training institute) school in Rudrapur, Dinajpur, can very easily be mistaken as an ancient, exotic, temple or structure from the land around the Himalayas. On a sunny morning, the school building basks in the glowing light and looks like an institution of happiness. Wrapped with the energy mesh of sun’s rays, colourful drapes and the fort-like architectural composition, it spreads an over powering message - learning with joy. Even at night, when the full moon shines, fireflies play, and the insects make music with their sound; the school structure stands as a blissful architecture of modern time.
Headmaster and chief facilitator of METI School, Prodip Francis Tigga said, ‘from the commencement of the METI School project in autumn 2005, visitors have eagerly come to observe the construction and fell in love with the amazing use of local materials like mud and straw, instead of bricks and cement. It seems to have left them very curios and fascinated’.
‘The school places an emphasis on helping children develop their own potential and use it in a creative way. The philosophy of METI is “learning with joy” and the teachers actually help children become innovative. Based on the principles of METI, all students actually religiously meditate every morning for a minute by closing their eyes to visualise their future and then discuss that with their fellow peers. This not only gives them a scope to think and have a vision but also gives them the power to dream of success’, Tigga added.
The architects for the project were Anna Heringer and Eike Roswag for their client - a local NGO called Dipshikha / METI non-formal Education, Training and Research Society for Village Development in cooperation with other organisations like Shanti-Germany and Kindermissionswerk (PMK). The project was completed in 2005. It needs to be mentioned that the METI School is the winner of the AR Emerging Architecture Award 2005 as well.
The school is a two-storey building, reflecting peace, because of the use of different coloured hangings, the spacious classrooms with bamboo-made blinds and designed in a way so that plenty of air and sunlight comes inside. The ground floor has three classrooms made of heavy mud while the first floor has two classrooms built with seasoned bamboos lashed with nylon chords.
Each of the three classrooms in the ground floor are connected through bolt-holes leading into caves by the walls. The caves are uniquely designed to make space as a retreat area for the pupils to read, concentrate and even snuggle up- to reflect and to meditate. The first floor has a view right across the paddy fields, over the pond and different types of trees. There is a tower attached to the classroom on the first floor to let the children conquer their imaginations and have a whole sight of their village- to decide what they want to do to improve their locale.
Stefan Neumann, civil engineer for Holst & Partner, Lubeck, Germany is also working in METI projects. He said, ‘before the earth could be used for the project, it first went through the sedimentation test which revealed that the soil in that area is mostly silt and a little bit of clay. To understand the structure of the soil and content of water in the loam, tests are performed to understand how much load the mud can bear’.
‘During the initial test of the mud, the ingredients were sent to Germany for testing. Finally, based on calculations, the loam is mixed with straw in the right proportion to make the formation strong enough for construction’, Stefan added.
This cheerful two-storey primary school uses traditional methods, incorporating Weller cob – walling technique; local and inexpensive materials of construction and adapts them in new ways to create light-filled beautiful spaces. The construction of the building brings out the best in locally available materials by combining them with improved construction techniques. Earthbound resources such as loam and straw are combined with lighter elements like bamboo sticks and nylon, lashed into shape to build a form that has sustainability and strength. This use of mud and straw is not only very environment friendly but the process can reduce the use of bricks, which, in turn, means, less pollution from the brick fields.
Anna Heringer the Architect and lecturer of the University of Linz in Austria was a volunteer of Dipshikha before graduating. She developed a starting point for the project ‘school hand made’ and after making a preparatory analysis of the village and developing it with three other students at Linz in 2002, she devoted her diploma thesis to a school building for the METI School in Rudrapur in 2005.
Heringer says, ‘when I first came here to work as a volunteer for Dipshikha, I spoke to the executive director of this organisation, Paul Charwa Tigga, who spoke about his vision of raising the living condition in Rudrapur. Therefore, designing and building METI School was the first trial. I always believed in the inspiring theme behind the construction of the school- “Children need firm roots and broad wings” the famous quote by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe, and tried to implement that thought.’
‘The aim of the project was to positively influence the image of loam buildings through a representative public building (which was decided to be the school). We wanted to improve the existing building techniques and to do that we had to construct something to learn how to improve it. We wanted to make it sustainable by utilizing local potential,’ she says.
‘So we started accordingly. Mud houses here have two major problems – dampness and rats- the rats literally dig up from the ground and in to the houses. The wholes made by them almost looks like Swiss cheese. To counter these problems, we gave brick foundation to the school and used Ferror cement and rammed earth, so that, even in the rainy season, the walls remain dry’, she added.
She continued that the main idea was to improve living standards by optimising resources and using cost-effective local materials so that the local people are benefited and can rid themselves of dependency. Plus, the use of mud, encapsulates the whole aura of our rural tradition. Local architects studying and practicing rural architecture like Khandakar Hasibul Kabir, a BRAC University lecturer of Architecture department and several students who graduated from that university who are working for the Dipshikha projects as volunteers have come in with their support.
She mentioned that their next project is to build residential houses out of mud like the METI School for the local people of Rudrapur. These houses would be two-storey mud duplex houses so that the residents use spaces vertically. This will ensure saving of spaces around the house for cultivation. They are also getting involved in capacity-building measures like the training of local workers and architects to use traditional materials and give practical knowledge which they do not get in the university. ‘The worst part about the BRAC University students who are working as volunteers here is that they are unpaid and do not get any credit for working in these projects. I remember our volunteer work here was accounted for in Austria and we got credit points in our bachelor’s course. This volunteering could be made open for other university students from architecture departments all over Bangladesh’.
The official Aga Khan Award website says that this prize for Architecture was established by the Aga Khan in 1977 to identify and encourage building concepts that successfully address the needs and aspirations of Muslim societies. The Award recognises examples of architectural excellence in all the places where Muslims live, in the fields of contemporary design, social housing, community improvement and development, historic preservation, reuse and area conservation, as well as landscape design and improvement of the environment.
The nine recipients of the Aga Khan Award for Architecture 2007 are: Samir Kassir Square, Beirut, Lebanon; Rehabilitation of the City of Shibam, Yemen; Central Market, Koudougou, Burkina Faso; University of Technology Petronas, Bandar Seri Iskandar, Malaysia; Restoration of the Amiriya Complex, Rada, Yemen; Moulmein Rise Residential Tower, Singapore; Royal Netherlands Embassy, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; Rehabilitation of the Walled City, Nicosia, Cyprus and School in Rudrapur, Dinajpur, Bangladesh.