School Buildings
Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia| Posted: 7/7/2008
Preservation
Preservation efforts are underway at Rosenwald school buildings across the South and Southwest. These buildings are being saved through a combination of grants, private donations, fundraising, and volunteer work. Many buildings have been given new life and new purposes, again becoming the centers of their local communities.
Case Studies
- Carroll School
- Highland Park School
- Hopewell School
- Noble Hill-Wheeler Memorial Center
- Remembering the Rosenwalds in Robeson County
- Walnut Cove School
Architecture
The school buildings were one of the many innovative features of the Rosenwald program. In the early twentieth century, Progressive architects applied new ideas to school design and developed new standards to evaluate school plans. Their concerns included lighting, ventilation, heating, sanitation, instructional needs, and aesthetics—all intended to create positive, orderly, and healthy environments for learning. Most of these designers and plans focused on urban schools, however. The designers of Rosenwald schools applied the same Progressive principles to country schools, and in so doing made the Rosenwald school building program a major force in rural school design.
