In October 2009 Baroness Morgan, Children's Minister, announced that acoustic testing will be a contractual requirement for all BSF (Building Schools for the Future) projects in England and it will mean that no PfS (Partnership for Schools) funding will be signed off for a BSF secondary school building project without a financial commitment to having the acoustic tests completed. This is in addition to the Minimum Design Standard being introduced into the BSF programme; under this scheme all proposed designs for BSF schools will have to be 'passed' by the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment. Designs not meeting the standard will be stopped at their final review.
Such a commitment is regarded by many as being long overdue and whilst acoustic testing is already carried out by some contractors its implementation has lacked impetus. The ministerial statement has now provided such impetus and the design practice note for clients, to be published by the dcsf in December 2010, is keenly awaited.
Schools are acoustically complicated buildings and the potential for architects and contractors to 'get things wrong' is considerable. An acoustics consultant should be appointed to every design team to ensure that the Minimum Design Standard is met and to carry out pre completion verification testing.
Such a commitment is regarded by many as being long overdue and whilst acoustic testing is already carried out by some contractors its implementation has lacked impetus. The ministerial statement has now provided such impetus and the design practice note for clients, to be published by the dcsf in December 2010, is keenly awaited.
Schools are acoustically complicated buildings and the potential for architects and contractors to 'get things wrong' is considerable. An acoustics consultant should be appointed to every design team to ensure that the Minimum Design Standard is met and to carry out pre completion verification testing.
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