Museum, District Collaborate To Build An Unusual Hybrid
In South Central Los Angeles, an area long plagued by overcrowded schools, the offspring of a partnership between the district and a state-owned science museum is taking shape. The progeny of the collaboration will serve two needs, as a neighborhood elementary school with a math- and science-focused curriculum and as a resource center for educators and the local community.
The goal is to "create a place where people could get very excited about science," says Dave Combs, California Science Center deputy director for education. The structure, now approaching completion near the museum in the northeast corner of Exposition Park, is a long, narrow, two-story steel frame that is partially submerged in the landscape at one end and seems to lift off the ground at the other. It will house 24 classrooms for first through fifth grades, clustered in groups of six that each share a common room to be used for group experiments.