Date/Time: November 5, 2026 | 2:30 – 3:30 pm

Room: SKAGIT 4

Abstract: As adolescent mental health continues to decline, the overlooked landscapes of our secondary schoolyards hold transformative potential. Yet for many teenagers, these spaces remain environments to endure rather than enjoy—paved, overheated, and disconnected from their wellbeing needs. Over five years of research involving students, designers, and school leaders reveals a consistent message: today’s school grounds are poised for meaningful reinvention to meet the needs of older youth.

This presentation uncovers how schoolyard design shapes behaviour, identity, and social connection, and how sport‑dominated, low‑budget environments inadvertently marginalise many young people—particularly girls, neurodiverse students, and LGBTQIA+ youth. Drawing on extensive qualitative research and cross-sector collaboration, it presents a compelling future vision of schoolyards as inclusive wellbeing landscapes that foster resilience, autonomy, and belonging – places where learning without limits is made possible by environments that honour the full spectrum of adolescent needs.

Attendees will discover how teenage play differs from childhood play; why self-regulation and calm zones matter; and how design can support risk-taking, identity formation, and ecological connection. The talk highlights climate-responsive strategies that address both rising mental health challenges and intensifying heat stress in school environments.

At a moment when school infrastructure is under national scrutiny, this session illuminates the critical role of landscape architecture in shaping healthier futures for young people. It challenges designers to rethink the schoolyard not as leftover space, but as vital public health infrastructure—and an untapped opportunity to create environments where young people can truly learn without limits. 

Learning Objectives:

1. Diagnose schoolyard impacts on adolescent wellbeing using evidence‑based tools. Learn how to assess the wellbeing performance of secondary schoolyards using practical diagnostic tools developed through the Schoolyard Greenprint. These tools help reveal how design factors such as shade, spatial diversity, heat exposure, and opportunities for social connection influence students’ mental health, autonomy, and sense of belonging.
2. Apply design and retrofit strategies that support rest, identity, risk-taking, and teenage play. Be equipped with design approaches—grounded in research and cross-sector collaboration—to create climate‑responsive, inclusive spaces that support adolescent self-regulation, identity formation, age‑appropriate risk-taking, and forms of play unique to teenage years. These strategies address challenges like sport-dominated layouts, limited natural diversity, pavement-heavy heat‑intensifying environments, and the practicalities of elements such as locker placement.
3. Co‑design schoolyard environments with diverse young people to enhance inclusion and safety. Gain skills to authentically engage adolescents— including LGBTQIA+ youth, neurodiverse students, and those affected by bullying—in collaborative design processes. They will learn methods tested in the research for incorporating youth insight into site planning, ensuring outcomes that are safer, more inclusive, and reflective of diverse needs and lived experiences.
4. Integrate climate‑resilience and public‑health principles into schoolyard planning. Understand how to position schoolyards as essential green infrastructure that mitigates heat stress, supports mental wellbeing, and strengthens ecological literacy. This objective equips designers and school leaders with strategies to respond to climate change while aligning environmental, health, and educational priorities in long‑term schoolyard transformation.