The Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership has officially opened at St Andrews Place, with the DesignInc-designed building creating opportunities for educators across Victoria to develop and share their expertise.

The $16.8 million fitout sees the 1858 building re-energised, becoming a world-class adult learning and teaching facility. DesignInc Principal Jane Sayers says the history and importance of the building laid the platform for the fitout.

"We aimed to create a sense of place that is memorable and rewarding," she says.

"We all know good teachers are instinctive storytellers. We wanted to inspire these amazing educators, so we weaved the interior narrative as a learning journey. We hope that narrative will resonate with people's experience of the building and inspire them.”

Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership

The three levels of the building are likened to a tree, with the basement imagined as the roots and earth, the centre as the trunk and the top level as the canopy. That narrative is layered with biophilic elements that express nature in the building fabric, including a number of plantations seen among the stairwell which connects each level like a tree.

The three levels are also a metaphor for time, with the basement library’s bluestone walls dark and atmospheric as a nod to the past, the centre as the present due to it being a social meeting point and the top as the future, where the majority of the professional learning happens.

The Academy’s CEO, Marcia Devlin, says the new space seeks to connect people with ideas, with the fitout shaping their sense of purpose.

“The space inspires imagination and innovation in professional learning for exceptional teachers and school leaders through a combination of natural light, living foliage, beautiful aesthetics, multiple layers, design, thinking, reflection and learning spaces and people interacting with all of these elements,” she says.

Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership

The Academy hopes to be a flagship for innovative pedagogical methods. The Academy’s spaces are versatile to account for future teaching methods. DesignInc incorporated elements of surprise, transformation and nature-based settings to stimulate ideas and challenge the status quo.

"Flexible spaces kindle creativity and experimentation, helping educators imagine what teaching and leadership can be and will be,” Sayers says.

DesignInc has brought 'hackable spaces' into the mix, with a room where teachers and school leaders can push their ideas to the limits and prototype concepts in real space. The spaces invite forward thinking and give educators the freedom to test, showcase, research, investigate, design, and play in spaces that are easily reconfigured. Christon says the facility will continue to remain at the forefront of teaching and learning thanks to the new fitout.

"We don't see the Academy as a static project. This facility will evolve over time if we have done our job well. The Academy is already using the spaces in ways we hadn't foreseen. We imagine the future of teaching as a process of constant change."

Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership

DesignInc has been approached by the Victorian Government to create an additional seven regional campuses across the state, in order to ensure advanced professional learning is accessible to all.

Jarrod Reedie

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