Background
In March of 2020, the Ministry of Education (EDU) provided capital funding approval to construct a new three (3) classroom addition to serve 69 pupil places at McKee Public School. The project is required to support attendance boundary changes between McKee PS, Avondale PS and Hollywood PS, that were required to manage the projected growth in the area (portables will remain necessary after this project is completed).
Since the Ministry of Education approval of the business case, TDSB has completed the Architect selection and the project awarded to Weiss Architecture & Urbanism Limited.
The Toronto District School Board (TDSB) with their Architectural Consultant are underway with plans for this three-classroom addition to McKee Public School.
Importantly, the design will utilize prefabrication and modular construction methods and technologies with the main objectives being a substantial decrease on-site construction activity and therefore increased site safety, decreasing onsite construction schedule, and to mitigate disruption to school activities and operations.
While the proposed McKee Public School addition is a small project, it is representative of dozens of projects that the TDSB undertakes regularly with its portfolio of nearly 600 schools. For this reason, the TDSB, and the Ministry of Education regard this project as an important ‘case study’ exploring the application of prefabrication and modularity as a rapid delivery construction method to complex existing building contexts.