School Buildings Need To Be Updated, According To Our Research…
The average public school in the United States is 42 years old. This is consistent with the average age of most public infrastructure within the country. Many of these schools and other public works projects were built at a time when the United States was uninhibited by international competition in manufacturing, technology, and science. We had the money to spend on infrastructure and culturally we understood the importance of the local public school. Charter schools and private schools had not yet entered into the public lexicon in the manner they have today. And as such care was taken to ensure that children had an environment to learn in that was conducive to the educational process.
The Current State of Education Expenditures in the U.S.
Fast-forward 40 years and the educational landscape in the U.S. is much different. There has been a dramatic push towards privatization. In many places locality does not indicate where you will attend school. The voucher program in many States has removed public monies from the public education system. And the result is a system that is hemorrhaging money with no reprieve in site.
We spent $620 billion on education last year in this country, which sounds like a tremendous amount of money, but only comes out to $12,296 per student. On average it costs $11,762 to educate a student in the U.S., but these numbers vary greatly depending on the State. In New York for instances it costs about $20,000 a year to educate a student whereas in Miami it only costs about $10,000. Due to these variances and a number of other factors, the $145 billion that should be spent on keeping up with school facilities is shorted by an estimated $46 billion a year. Causing the issue, we know see with aging schools and a crumbling infrastructure.
However, some communities and townships have taken their slim budget and made the best of it by employing the use of prefab school buildings. Cities like Atwater, California have built beautiful prefab school buildings with the use of metal building kits. In doing so they have found one possible solution for the need of more space in which to educate children, as well as a means to create newer environments for learning.
Prefab School Buildings as a Possible Solution
In the past 20 years there has been an increase of 8 million students, K-12, in the United States. This has caused a great many towns and cities throughout the country to struggle with where to put these children. The average class size in 2010 was 21.2 students whereas today it is 24.3 students. This increase of 3 children per class may not seem like much, but on a day-to-day basis it can truly tax the teachers and the space in which they teach.
Lacking the funding necessary to construct brand new brick and mortar school houses, many communities throughout the country have begun to look to prefab school building as a way to meet their demands for space, without breaking their budget.
The cost of a brand new, traditionally built, High School building is roughly $242 per sq. ft. This comes out to about $26 million for a High School of average size. Whereas with a prefab school building, that cost is cut to around $110 per sq. ft. Which comes out to around $11 million.
Beyond putting up a school that is built entirely out of a metal building kit, many school districts are also looking to portable classrooms as a means to house and educate their students. This is usually considered to be less then desired. But the portable classes that are constructed using a metal building kit are a great way in the interim to deal with an increase in student population.
So since there does not seem to any reprieve coming any time soon for the cash strapped education system in the U.S. we have to think of creative ways to continue to offer top-notch education. We have to look to technologies such as prefab school buildings and metal building kits, as a means to help alleviate some of the budget deficits we are facing. And in turn we will be able to help rebuild our aging school infrastructure and continue to educate our children in the manner they should be educated.
Purchase Metal Building Kits Today
Our goal at Titan Steel Structures is to give you the easiest building solutions without compromising quality, so if you are in the interested in learning more about the benefits of a metal building kits or prefab school buildings then give us a call today at 1-855-964-4030, or request a free quote online. Titan Steel Structures’ expert and knowledgeable staff are available Monday thru Friday from 9:00am to 6:00pm. We’re here to serve and guide you through the building selection process.