Children require play. Not only is it is an essential part of their development; children have a lot of energy! As children move into a school environment, they require a space to let loose. Traditionally, school playgrounds serve as a place to release and have fun. Unfortunately, not all playgrounds are created equal.

The problem

In the City of Philadelphia, there is a great disparity in the types of school playgrounds available. Some playgrounds offer jungle gyms, monkey bars, basketball courts, and more. Meanwhile, other students compete with parkings lots and dumpsters for a place to play during the school day. School playgrounds should be created equally; and, in reality, they are not. In addition, there is no database to track school facilities on a citywide scale. The information is scattered or unavailable, making it hard for communities to advocate for themselves.

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What defines a school playground?

So, what is the baseline for a school playground? What makes a playground safe or unsafe? Children are wildly adaptive to their environment. They will make a ball out of plastic bags and turn a parking lot into an obstacle course. For insight, I interviewed experts in the field of school play on how to properly evaluate school playspaces. In this process, I also looked to see what other cities were doing around their development of school playgrounds. Turns out, cities like Denver and Boston have undergone city-wide renovations of their school playgrounds with positive effects.

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“Anywhere people can play”

Bambi Yost, Professor of Landscape Architecture + Co-Founder of Learning Landscapes

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