San Mateo-Foster City School District (SMFCSD) celebrated the grand opening of the new Beach Park Elementary School in Foster City, CA. The HMC Architects design team, district staff, and community neighbors gathered for a ribbon-cutting ceremony to celebrate the new elementary school which will accommodate 420 students.

Beach Park’s student-centered vision is to develop students who are responsible for their learning and use empathy to collaborate academically and socially. To encourage collaboration and hands-on learning, the school features classrooms clusters with shared indoor and outdoor collaboration areas, a flexible Library/Media Center with small group instructional rooms, learning nooks for instruction, and quiet space for reading and conversation.  The campus also features a multipurpose building with a warming kitchen and servery that can be used for dining, student performances, and community outreach.  Materials and accent colors have been selected to coincide with the school’s vision; terracotta represents creativity, blue represents peace, and green represents positivity. Flexible furniture was selected to create agile learning environments and support the different ways students learn.

The vision of the school began in 2016 and was made possible through Measure X, a $148 M bond measure enabling facilities to provide additional classrooms, relieve overcrowding, and address increasing enrollment at San Mateo and Foster City schools.