Colegio Pioneros

Award Criteria

Architectural Excellence

Located in the district of Chicureo in Santiago, Chile, this school houses more than 350 students up to 7 years old.
It was built in only 2 months at the beginning of 2022, allowing the Pioneers educational project to start along with the Chilean school term.

The building structure consists of 56 plant-fabricated steel modules at a total area of approximately 9,000 square feet, which are used to for classrooms, recreation rooms, a music room, restrooms, locker rooms, a cafeteria, and a dining area. The building is complemented by prefabricated steel structures used to generate recreation areas and interactive classrooms.

The combination of both types of buildings creates a single monolithic space, or rather a single building in which an innovative educational project is developed. The façade of the school is composed of insulated panels with steel cladding that make up the modules.

Technical Innovation & Sustainability

The solution proposed of using steel-structure modules and panels with polyurethane insulation, clad with steel sheeting, allowed for significant savings in both time, on-site resources, water consumption, and waste generation.

All of the structural steel used in the project, including the steel sheets making up the building's façade, were 100% manufactured using renewable energy.

The thermal efficiency achieved by the aforementioned structures and cladding, together with the thermopanel windows installed in the modules, is noteworthy in the resulting in low-energy consumption compared to other solutions on the market.

Cost Effectiveness

Direct land costs and construction site costs were reduced by the use of 100% factory-finished modules, together with a simple joint design and the use of prefabricated foundations. The use of prefabricated steel structures for recreational areas also made it possible to generate low-cost roofed spaces sufficient for the development of work as it was carried out in these areas.

As previously mentioned, this reduction of the project deadline allowed the Pioneros project to open and to start school operations on time for the start of the Chilean school year beginning in March of each year, as well as in order to meet its expectations of returns, which take into consideration the revenue associated with 2022 school year enrollment.