Our School Design

Te Ao Mārama School is a modern and future focused school and this is reflected in its design and build. The design has been based on sound educational research on how children learn best. 

The school was designed by award winning architects, ASC  https://ascarchitects.co.nz/projects/education/ppp3-primary-schools/

The buildings and environment provide flexible and collaborative spaces and furniture designed to better cater for a variety of learning opportunities and styles.

Each learning area has multiple rooms to meet a range of learning needs and activities. The learning areas each have a large central learning space, 3-4 breakout rooms, a substantial makerspace area (for art/cooking/technology) and teacher workroom. They have quiet spaces to support independent learning and focus.
 

The learning areas are all engineered and designed for acoustics, natural lighting and ventilation.

The school is a public – private partnership (PPP).  This means that a private company has built an amazing high quality school with incredible facilities and resources and is also responsible for maintaining it. This frees the Principal and board of trustees from the burden of property maintenance and allows us to focus our time and energy on teaching and learning. 

The  Ministry of Education has signed a contract with ShapED to design, construct and maintain five schools (including ours) across New Zealand. This is a Public Private Partnership (PPP) worth $220 million.

ShapED is a consortium of businesses. It is led by a specialist infrastructure investment management firm Morrison & Co and also includes CPB Contractors and South Island-based Southbase Construction, one of New Zealand’s leading architectural practices ASC and facilities manager Spotless Facility Services.

Having companies with such vast experience both in New Zealand and overseas is a huge bonus – it means we have the best possible people to create a cutting-edge modern facility.

Our school also has a hall/gym, library, meeting rooms, and parents’ area with coffee making facilities. Our grounds include playgrounds, hard courts, sports fields and incredible landscaping and seating areas.

We are also very fortunate to have the Hamilton City Council Hare Puke Park playground right beside school.