Designing for Inspiration and Dignity

Long gone are the days of fluorescent lighting, rows of metal desks, and stark white paint on every wall in schools. Today, school campuses are being designed for both students and educators—with their mental and physical wellbeing top of mind—offering bold environments that are inclusive, energy-efficient, and inspirational.

To achieve innovative designs, communities often partner with integrated design firms. Different from a traditional architecture firm, an integrated design firm engages all the design professionals who work to make a building come to life. Integrated design looks not only to the shell of the building, but to all of its aspects: from the space planning of the facility, to the engineering of its electrical, mechanical, and plumbing systems, as well as its interior and exterior finishes.

“We’re seeing design come to life from beginning to very end,” Baylor University alumna Jillian Diffee, RID, IIDA, said. “It’s a holistic process that truly celebrates the voices of all professionals through the entire life of the design.”

Diffee works in Houston for DLR Group, a global integrated design firm. As a senior associate in the firm, she and her teams explore student health and wellness and examine ways to enhance these factors through the built environment of K-12 education spaces. Ultimately, Diffee helps communities reimagine what the learning environment could be. 

“People are either positively or negatively impacted by design, and I’m committed to designing environments that are positively impactful to people: environments that decrease factors of loneliness, that bring people together and cultivate community, that encourage people to access the truest version of themselves that the Lord made them to be.”

Jillian Diffee, RID, IIDA

At the start of her college experience, Diffee recalls that the profession of interior design wasn’t on her radar. However, after utilizing Baylor’s Career Center, she decided to tour the Interior Design program in Robbins College Health and Human Sciences’ Department of Human Sciences and Design (HSD).

“I know the Lord was leading me to this wonderful career serving others. I took that leap of faith based on the conviction I felt. I also had a deep desire to engage both the analytical and creative sides of my brain,” she recalled. “Not many careers allow those two things to come together. Fortunately, interior design truly is just that.”

Research shows that when the environment follows specific design strategies, a student’s ability to engage with their learning grows exponentially. In pursuit of these outcomes, Diffee follows evidence-based design strategies such as flexibility, individualization, nature and naturalness, and stimulation, which are applicable across the board.

“I don’t know about the school you attended when you were a child, but for me, there were concrete walls and maybe a window every once in a while. Overall, just not a very exciting place to be or to want to go to learn,” she recalled. “The educational spaces of today are no longer like that—now they are designed to be agile, inspire learning, and frame opportunities for their students and teachers to really thrive. We constantly ask how this space wants to look, feel, and function, so that all inhabitants have the best chance to succeed in this space.”

Trendy architecture, while flashy and shiny, doesn’t equate to wellbeing. Leading with listening allows Diffee to understand her clients’ unique needs, so that the design outcome is a tailored, effective solution for them. Currently, she is putting this philosophy into practice while designing a facility that serves students with extreme special needs—a scenario that calls for a growth mindset and spirit of collaboration to get the design right. 

“Significant challenges are posed if the school community—the students, the educators, those who are actually going to ‘live’ in the building—does not have a voice in the process. The design isn’t going to work for them if it means nothing to them,” she stated. “So, design is so much more than following trends, it’s about curating solutions for those who are going to inhabit the building. Pairing what we hear from the client with what we know from research creates unique, effective design solutions.”

Built environments influence the way we engage with our own health and wellbeing. While there is longstanding research about the ways students learn and their needs for academic engagement, there is less research toward understanding the needs of educators. Diffee and her teams at DLR Group are contributing to research on the mental and psychological wellbeing of educators as it relates to the school built environment. For an educator, the school building is their workplace, just as a commercial office might be for another type of professional. To apply these insights, her team is intentional in selecting appropriately sized furnishings, designing collaborative spaces for educators, and ensuring clear lines of sight on all levels for safety.

“We start out our process with visioning. We say, ‘Let’s think about your dream learning environment,’ and hope that our educators think big with things like, ‘I want a life-size tree that my kindergarteners can touch and experience for creative imagining.’ Yet, so often, the first answers that we hear are, ‘Can I just please have working outlets in my room?’ ‘I would love to have a light switch that turns on or turns off on my command.’ Or, ‘Please, we just need more storage,’” she said. “These things are a given when constructing learning environments up to code today. Educators have learned to do so much with so little. As the designer, it’s our role to create spaces of dignity for that educator, striving to meet both their physical needs and their mental needs.” 

To be a successful designer, you must be able to think outside of the box, consider opportunities that aren’t physically seen in front of you, and be able to imagine something that doesn’t yet exist. Diffee’s time at Baylor was instrumental in her ability to do that. 

“A lot of people might think of interior design and assume that we pick out throw pillows or select paint colors, and that’s true. We do those things in some respects, but there’s a much deeper aspect to what we do,” she said. “I find meaning beyond myself in the practice of design. People are either positively or negatively impacted by design, and I’m committed to designing environments that are positively impactful to people: environments that decrease factors of loneliness, that bring people together and cultivate community, that encourage people to access the truest version of themselves that the Lord made them to be.”

ABOUT ROBBINS COLLEGE OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SCIENCES AT BAYLOR UNIVERSITY

Established in 2014, Robbins College of Health and Human Sciences seeks to enhance health, quality of life, and human flourishing for all individuals and communities through education, research, and innovation. It includes six academic departments—Communication Sciences and Disorders; Health, Human Performance, and Recreation; Human Sciences and Design; Occupational Therapy; Physical Therapy; and Public Health—along with the Division of Health Professions, which houses the Master of Physician Assistant Studies program. Robbins College offers 13 bachelor’s degrees, eight master’s degrees, and six doctoral degrees, as well as nine graduate programs in partnership with the U.S. Army. Graduate programs in Robbins College are offered in a variety of modalities, including on campus, online, and hybrid.