Ta’talu Elementary School

The new Ta’talu Elementary School will provide learning spaces for 575 grades 1-7 students and 80 kindergartens in the rapidly growing Grandview Heights area of Surrey. It will be the District’s first three-storey elementary school.

The school consists of two three-storey stacks of learning neighbourhoods on the east and west ends of the building that are made up of four to five classrooms that open onto a project space. All the shared program spaces – such as the learning commons, multi-purpose room, administration areas and gym – are in the centre of the building, connected to the learning neighbourhoods by a central atrium. The atrium is the heart of the building, providing wayfinding for the entire school and visually connecting students on all floors to the rest of the student population.

Ta’talu aims to reduce its environmental impact by using passive building design strategies and to reduce its carbon emissions by minimizing the use of gas fueled equipment. The school is aiming to be operationally Net Zero carbon either at the school’s completion or in the future with the addition of photovoltaics. The mass timber structure of the school matches the sustainable ambitions of the project, and reduces embodied carbon in construction.