In the ever-evolving landscape of K-12 education, the infrastructure of school facilities plays a pivotal role in shaping the learning environment and, consequently, student outcomes. The Technical Assistance Program (TAP) in Oregon is a beacon of support for school districts, offering grants that enable schools to plan and execute capital improvements and expansions. This comprehensive guide aims to shed light on the TAP grants and how they can be leveraged to enhance educational facilities across Oregon.
Understanding TAP Grants
TAP grants are instrumental in helping districts not only plan for future growth but also address immediate concerns such as deferred maintenance and environmental hazards. The program offers four types of grants:
Facilities Condition Assessments - Evaluating the current state of a school districts facilities.
Long-Range Facility Planning - Strategizing for future facility needs and improvements.
Seismic Assessments - Assessing the structural integrity of buildings in the event of earthquakes.
Environmental Hazard Assessments - Identifying potential environmental risks within school properties.
These assessments are crucial for maintaining safe and conducive learning environments and are required for participation in programs like the Oregon School Capital Improvement Matching (OSCIM) program and Business Oregon’s Seismic Rehabilitation Grant Program.
Oregon School District leadership teams can review all information about the ODE TAP Grants, Funding, & Application Processes here: https://www.oregon.gov/ode/schools-and-districts/grants/Pages/Technical-Assistance-Program.aspx
The R&C Management team knows that districts don’t regularly go through this process, and we can offer consultative support to take some of the guesswork out of the application process, and thereby maximize your grant potential, assessments, and long-term planning. We’re here to help!
The Role of TAP Certified Assessors
TAP Certified Assessors are professionals certified by the Oregon Department of Education. They possess extensive professional experience and training, ensuring that the standards and reporting requirements for facilities assessments and long-range plans are met with precision and expertise. An experienced TAP Certified Assessor can help School Districts evaluate:
Capacity: Adjusting facilities to meet the needs of the student population.
Support for Programs: Providing spaces for specialized curriculum offerings like STEAM.
Technology: Ensuring robust infrastructure to support digital learning.
Supervision and Security: Designing physical configurations that promote safety.
Instructional Aides: Equipping classrooms with necessary tools and storage solutions.
Physical Characteristics: Creating spaces that accommodate diverse teaching styles.
Learning Environment: Optimizing lighting, air quality, temperature, and acoustics for learning.
Relationship of Spaces: Strategically placing essential facilities like libraries and cafeterias in relation to classrooms.
Educational Adequacy Review Standards
The ODE has identified five key facets of school facilities that are pivotal for student success. These standards are not only research-based but also universally applicable across all districts, ensuring that every instructional building can benefit from these improvements:
Acoustics & Noise: Proper acoustic design is essential for reducing noise levels, which can significantly distract students and impede learning. TAP grants can assist in assessing and improving the acoustic environment to promote better concentration and communication.
Air Quality: Clean air is crucial for maintaining the health and well-being of students and staff. TAP grants support environmental hazard assessments to identify and mitigate any issues related to air quality, ensuring a healthier learning atmosphere.
Lighting: Adequate lighting is necessary for visual tasks and can influence mood and energy levels. Through TAP grants, schools can evaluate their lighting systems and plan upgrades to enhance visual clarity and comfort.
Temperature: A comfortable temperature range is vital for maintaining focus and preventing discomfort. TAP’s long-range facility planning includes assessments of HVAC systems to ensure they provide stable and comfortable temperatures throughout the school year.
School Capacity and Classroom Space: As enrollment fluctuates, it’s important for facilities to adapt to the changing needs of the student population. TAP grants help districts plan for expansions or renovations to accommodate growth, conversion, and maintain optimal learning environments.
By focusing on these five areas in all Long-Range Facility Planning assessments, the ODE ensures that the physical elements of school facilities are conducive to learning and teaching. The educational adequacy review standards emphasize indoor environmental quality, which has a profound impact on cognitive performance and comfort for both students and teachers.
TAP Grants: Enhancing Educational Facilities
TAP grants are a cornerstone for Oregon’s K-12 school districts, providing the necessary resources to conduct comprehensive assessments and create long-range facility plans. By aligning with the ODE’s educational adequacy review standards, these grants enable schools to:
Identify areas of improvement within their facilities.
Plan and implement strategies for capital improvements and expansions.
Ensure that school buildings are safe, secure, and optimized for educational success.
Incorporating these standards into the assessment and planning process allows districts to create environments that are not just physically sound but also tailored to enhance the educational experience.
Conclusion
The TAP grants serve as a vital resource for Oregon’s K-12 school districts, providing the means to assess, plan, and improve school facilities. By adhering to the educational adequacy standards and utilizing the expertise of TAP Certified Assessors, districts can ensure that their schools are not only safe and secure but also optimized for educational excellence.
For school districts seeking to navigate the complexities of capital improvements and expansions, understanding, and utilizing TAP grants is a step towards creating a future where the learning environment is a catalyst for student success.
For more information, please complete the form below to get in contact with the TAP Certified Assessor team at R&C Management Group.
The R&C Management Group Difference:
The R&C Management team is comprised of multiple professionals with prior careers in architecture, construction, engineering, accounting, communications, and permitting. We are assembled to provide full TAP, Pre-Bond, Program, Project/Construction Management, and Post Bond support services for school districts across Oregon and SW Washington. R&C Management Group has grown to offer a broad spectrum of services, including facility condition assessments.
Our Senior Project Manager, Scott Rose, has directly conducted over 35 million square feet of facility assessments, and managed multiple diverse project types, most notably in K-12 education.
Most notable is his management of the assessment of every educational facility in the State of Montana. With planning and reporting, the project took a year, but the actual assessment included managing 42 inspectors over a 13-week period over the entire state of Montana, which included 2,200 buildings, 240 towns, and 31 million square feet. Few other people in the country have managed a statewide K-12 facility assessment.
In terms of diversity of facilities and locations, Scott has also managed:
Full assessment of New Orleans public housing: 60 million square feet over 32 campuses throughout the city of New Orleans.
Full assessment of all Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife facilities: 24 million square feet in some of the most remote areas of Oregon.
Full assessment of 6 shopping malls for a due diligence pre-purchase study: 2 million square feet in 4 states over a 6-day period.
R&C Management Group regularly conducts the ODE TAP Grant Assessments for school districts across the state of Oregon. One of the more recent districts, Fern Ridge in Elmira, Oregon, included not only the 4 schools but also their transportation barn, water treatment structure, batting cage, grandstand, historic administrative building, and more. In short, we know diverse facilities, and have worked in a wide variety of locations.
While each member of our team has conducted K-12 facility assessments with their prior firms, R&C Management Group has conducted facility assessments as part of our overall bond management services across 12 school districts for a total of roughly 95 schools. This translates to roughly 2.3 million square feet per year over the last five years as a subset of the other services that we provide.
For the ODE TAP Grant and OSCIM Program, Scott was an adjunct technical resource to the first ODE Facilities task force in 2011. That task force was eventually defunded and a new one initiated in 2013, of which Scott was then a member. Recommendations were forwarded from our group to the legislature in 2014 and the program emerged in 2015. Scott was involved most heavily in the data format for the assessment template currently used and provided input to the long-range facility planning criteria. Scott was in the first group to become a certified assessor in 2015. Since that time, he has continuously served on the ODE School Facilities Advisory Group that meets at least annually.
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