Eight different sites on which projects are currently proposed for the Los Angeles Unified School District are considered in Coleman's recent studios. The projects combine an elementary school program with ancillary civic, commercial, and/or residential functions. The sites were selected because of their location on active streets in neighborhoods that have a mix of commerical and residential uses and have street edges appropriate for public activities. Because elementary schools, for security and safety reasons, are required to be insular and separated, they tend not to give back much activity to the street, except for the brief times when the students are arriving and departing. As well, the multi-purpose rooms and outdoor spaces of the schools are under-utilized on evenings and weekends, when they could be productive spaces for residents of their communities.

Students have examined the sites and program issues to determine suitable activities that might be overlaid on the school functions. The resulting projects propose new hybrids that allow different and sometimes non-overlapping functions to coexist on a site, test how additional functions might coexist with elementary schools to enrich neighborhoods, activate the street, and provide additional space through overlapping uses at different times of day and week, and search for processes that continue and enrich the unique urban structure of Los Angeles.

My contribution to this research consisited in organizing and summarizing the student projects and then creating a website to publish selected studio projects that were particularly informative for the exploration.