Figuring out how to arrange a small classroom starts with a definition: anything under 500 square feet counts as small. Below 300 square feet the room usually gets a different name (bungalow, portable, repurposed office, reading intervention room), but the constraints are the same across all of th …

Figuring out how to furnish a school cafeteria the right way is harder than it looks. A facilities director in Illinois found that out the hard way. She ordered cafeteria tables in June. The tables arrived in August. They looked right, fit the room, and came in under budget. By November, her custo …

Last August, a district purchasing officer in Minnesota placed an order she had placed a dozen times before. Thirty individual desks for a third-grade classroom. Same spec, same configuration, same logic as fifteen years ago. By October, the principal was on the phone asking about returns. The des …