Los Angeles Unified School District to Receive 2011 Q Award for Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools

LOS ANGELES, June 17, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- The Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) will receive The Alliance for Quality Construction's "Q Award" for the construction of the Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools on June 28, 2011. The complex mixes historical significance and high environmental green building methods and materials.

The site rests on the historic Ambassador Hotel, where Senator Robert Kennedy was assassinated in 1968. The park within the school serves as a memorial to Robert Kennedy including benches bearing information about Kennedy's work. Serving as an area of open space, it features a 20-ft high by 30-ft wide stainless steel wall displaying excerpts from the senator and presidential candidate's speech given in South Africa. The award honors the LAUSD for its 6 pilot school complex comprising of an 83,000 sq feet, 840 seat elementary school, 438,000 sq ft, 3,440 seat middle school/high school and 1/3 acre parking lot along Wilshire Boulevard. It cost approximately $571 million.

The complex exceeds the strict environmental standards set by the Collaborative for High Performance Schools (CHPS) reflecting the latest "green" building methods and materials. It is the first in California to use a technology called 'thermal displacement ventilation' in which air is delivered from the lower portion of the walls, rather than from the ceiling, thus resulting in a more energy efficient way of cooling and improving air quality while reducing the amount of germs that travel through the air. A full-glass curtain wall façade on the north face of the high school building maximizes natural light in the classrooms.

The following Pilot Schools are part of the six that make up the RFK Community Schools:

• Ambassador School of Global Education (K-5)
• Ambassador School of Global leadership (6-12)
• New Open World Academy (K-12)
• UCLA Community School (K-12)
• Los Angeles High School of the Arts (9-12)
• School for the Visual Arts and Humanities (9-12)

AQC Chair, Pam Ackrich said, "Not only is the concept of several schools on a single property unique, but the way in which the historical value of the pre-existing buildings was incorporated into the union-built project makes it truly deserving of the award."

Construction for the schools began in December 2007 and opened September 2010. The design architect was Pasadena-based Gonzalez Goodale Architects and was built by Hensel Phelps Construction Co.

AQC's "Q Award" is given annually for outstanding contributions toward the attainment of quality construction within the building industry of Southern California. The winner is selected by the Alliance's membership from quality union construction projects completed in the previous year. Recipients of previous Q Awards have been the new LAPD Headquarters (2010), Los Angeles Unified School District's Performing Arts High School #9 (2009), Nokia Theatre at LA LIVE (2008), Renee and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall in Orange County (2007), The Getty Villa in Malibu (2006), The Home Depot Center in Dominguez Hills (2005), The Walt Disney Concert Hall (2004), and Our Lady of the Angels Cathedral (2003).

ABOUT AQC

The Alliance for Quality Construction, a Southern California association of union contractors and building trades unions dedicated to promoting industry awareness of the value, quality and integrity provided by union contractors and their skilled craftsmen.

SOURCE Alliance for Quality Construction