Laura Blokker, interim director of the Tulane University School of Architecture's Preservation Studies program, and Andrew Liles, assistant professor of architecture at the school, have won the Richard L. Blinder Award, a $15,000 grant from the Trustees of the James Marston Fitch Charitable Foundation that will aid the researchers in their efforts to repurpose abandoned school facilities originally built to enforce Jim Crow-era racial segregation in education. 

The schools, built as part a last-ditch attempt to establish "separate but equal" educational facilities in the state, were abandoned as racial integration began to take hold in 1970, and have sat empty for many years. The grant award will allow researchers to work with alumni of the schools in designing reuse strategies for the buildings, Tulane News reports. 

The research project will include identifying the surviving schools across the state so that the research team can "assess and categorize the overall design, plans and materials of the buildings." This survey and research work will inform the creation of a set of preservation recommendations as well as the generation of design explorations for their potential reuse. Blokker tells Tulane News that possible reuses include converting the buildings into senior housing, new community centers, and other necessary facilities. Following this work, two specific schools will be selected by the research teams to serve as case studies for reuse efforts. 

"The final product will be a graphic and textual handbook of materials and plans with recommendations for preservation and new design, featuring renderings along with other photographs and illustrations," Tulane News reports. 

Regarding the project, Blokker explains that “For many years, these mid-century African American school buildings have sat vacant, many preferring they be forgotten and their history silenced," adding, “We must not ignore America’s past. These schools were created in the era of segregation and that story must be told – not to commemorate oppression, but to celebrate the legacy of generations of African American educators, leaders and communities who nurtured these learning environments and sprung from them.”