John A. Dubiski Career High School in Grand Prairie is a public high school of choice with a focus on equipping students with the skills needed for 21st century professions. Click on image for more photos of 21st century schools.

Gone are classrooms with chalkboards, rows of desks and teachers who only lecture. Consider instead a school with moveable walls, tables with laptop connections, and an instructor who facilitates lessons with online videos, interactive experiments, and small groups of students.

Welcome to 21^st century learning, an approach to education that seeks to bring today’s schools into the modern age through technology, design, and new ways of delivering instruction.

“We need to prepare our students for the future,” said HISD’s Sue Robertson, general manager of Facility Planning. “The goal of the 2012 bond program is to ensure we are designing facilities that reflect the importance of collaboration, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving.”

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HISD’s Woodrow Wilson Montessori School and the Green Mountain Energy Sun Club have “flipped the switch” the school’s new solar panels, which will provide a renewable source of energy for the Houston magnet school and help students learn about solar energy.

The solar system was made possible by a $50,000 donation from the Sun Club, a voluntary program in which Green Mountain Energy Company residential customers, including many in Houston, make monthly contributions toward solar generation systems for non-profits.

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Rusk School officials and community members broke ground Monday on a new addition that will house the school’s middle school students.

Rusk school officials and community members break ground on a new addition to the school.

The PK-8 school’s 21,000-square-foot, eight-classroom building is among the final projects under the 2007 bond program. About 40 people gathered under a tent as light rain fell during the groundbreaking at the East End neighborhood campus.

Chief School Officer Chip Zullinger said it was important to mark the day.

“This is one of the last projects, and we’re here today to get started with some new and exciting things for the future of The Rusk School,” Zullinger said.

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HISD Senior CAD Designer Gregory Poitier is attempting to digitize the district’s archives for preservation and easier access.

When HISD’s Condit Elementary moved into its new building in 1914, it became the first public school in Houston’s Bellaire neighborhood. Ninety-nine years and several renovations later, it remains in the same building, surrounded by new houses, schools and businesses.

To view the transformation of Condit and other HISD campuses across a century and more, pay a visit to the district’s archive room. Located in HISD’s Construction and Facility Services Building on Center Street, the archives contain thousands of blueprints for district buildings, organized alphabetically by elementary, middle and high schools — dating back to 1912.

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Want to stay better informed about the bond programs at HISD? The district now features an integrated website, www.houstonisd.org/bond, on the 2012 and 2007 bond programs.

This site offers information on procurement opportunities, project updates, real estate sales, the Office of Business Assistance, and an interactive map to locate bond schools. Since its launch, more than 6,000 people have visited the site.

The website even features a section on 21st century schools — complete with articles and videos — that highlights the innovative strategies and designs being implemented across the country to boost student achievement.

Other features include a calendar of bond activities, an RSS feed of all bond news from the blog, and an archive section for press coverage and the monthly Building Excellence eNewsletter.

Have a question? Submit it to bondinfo@houstonisd.org, and an HISD representative will contact you.

Berry Elementary School's new building features 90 percent natural light in highly occupied areas.

Houston Independent School District’s Berry Elementary School was recently awarded the Sustainability Design Excellence Award by the Texas and Oklahoma chapter of the International Interior Design Association (IIDA) and was named a runner-up for the Best of the Year award by Interior Design Magazine.

The awards come just a year after construction was completed on the $15.6 million campus as part of the HISD’s 2007 bond program. That $805 million in funding has helped build 19 new schools so far, with another three slated for completion by the end of 2014.

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