TIME SAVER STANDARDS FOR BUILDING TYPES

RUANG KULIAH
Factor utama yang menjadi pertimbangan di dalam merancang sebuah ruang perkuliahan adalah:
• Metode pengajaran – jenis kurikulum yang relevan
• Tempat duduk, meja tulis, dan laptop
• Ruanagn dan perlengkapan untuk dosen
• Pemakaian elemen pengisi dinding, termasuk papan tulis, layar, ukuran dan letak
jendela, dan lain-lain
• Fasilitas ohp dan televise.
• Coat racks, gudang, dan peralatan kenyamanan yang lainnya.
• System akustik dan tata pencahayaan
• Pemanas dan pendingin ruangan
• Pertimbangan estetika.

Classroom Seating
The seating arrangement is the most important feature in determining the size and shape of a
classroom. Seating arrangement in a classroom should provide all students with a good view of
the front marker board; ready access both to the seats and to marker boards on other walls; an
adequate, well illuminated writing surface at each seat a place to set books and papers;
reasonable comfort; and privacy in taking examinations.
In a class of 50 or fewer students, where a long front marker is desirable, it seems better to have
the front wall longer than the side walls. This presupposes that there are more students in a row
of seats than there are rows; for example, visibility is better in a classroom having row of seven
than in one having seven rows of five seats.
In a room measuring 26 feet by 30 feet, with separate tablet armchair for 35 students, the seven
seats in a row might have a spacing of 3 feet-6 inches between seat centers laterally and 4 feet-6
inches between the end seat centers and side walls (6 x 3 feet-6 inches + 9 feet = 30 feet).
Spacing from front to back in a column might be 3 feet between seat centers with 4 feet behind
the back-seat center and 10 feet between the front-seat center and the front marker board (4 x 3
feet + 14 feet = 26 feet). This pattern allows for aisles of about 20 inches columns, a width just
under the 22-inch unit width used as standard in estimating the number of persons who can walk
abreast in a corridor or stair hall. This arrangement requires about 22 square feet of space per
student. Lecture halls whose seats have folding tablet arms may allow 15 square feet or less per
student.
Close-packed seating arrangements are not the most desirable, but sometimes are necessary
because the larger rooms are not available. Laws in some states provide that no person shall
have to pass more than six others to reach an aisle; hence 14 persons in a row between aisles is
an absolute maximum. If 10 to 14 students sit next to each other in a row behind a long strip
table or writing ledge, the ledge should be at least 12 inches wide and should provide at least 2
feet of length per person. An arrangement whereby the nearer half of the writing surface in front
of each person can fold up and away from the writer give more room for students to pass. A
spacing between rows of 42 inches between seat centers is adequate for most seating
arrangements that use strip tables for writing.
Tablet armchairs are commonly used for seating in college classrooms and permit rows to be
spaced every 3 feet. They are satisfactory for most classes that do not make use of special
equipment, provided they have a large writing surface and a shelf underneath for book and
papers. Tablet armchairs may be found either fixed to the floor, fastened together in sets of two
to six that can be moved as a group, or individually movable. When chairs are fixed to the floor,
the arrangements should be one that permits good visibility and ready access. Good visibility
may be achieved in three ways: by sloping the floor, by staggering seats in consecutive rows, or
by wide spacing.
An arrangement permitting a class of 30 to spread out for examination purpose in a 26-foot by
26-foot classroom seating 40 students would be the following: in each of five rows, spaced 3
feet apart from front to back between seat centers. Let two triples of seats be placed with the
centers 2 feet apart laterally and with a 4-foot central aisle from front to back between triples. In
5-foot aisles at the sides. Let movable tablet armchairs be placed next to the fixed seats for
lectures and recitations (keeping the 3-foot aisle by the walls), but let these chair be moved over
next to the walls during the examination. Another pattern involves joint activity by two
instructors whose adjoining classrooms are separated by a folding partition, and can be
combined into a larger room for 60 for appropriate portions of the instruction.

Front platform
In front of students’ seating area, there should be enough space for the lecturer to walk back and
forth before a long marker board. In rooms with more than five rows of seats there is an
advantage in having a platform, possibly 8 inches above the floor and extending the full width of
the room, on which the teacher may walk the length of the board without danger of failing off
the end. The marker board should then be raised correspondingly higher above the classroom
floor for better visibility. The teacher needs a table to place lecture note and papers, but it is
better to have this table either movable on casters or fixed at the side of the platform where it
does not block the view of the marker board from the first two rows of students. If a projector is
to be used, there must either be a place where it can be mounted permanently at the front of the
room, or there must be provision for rolling it in on a cart and connecting it electrically. In the
latter case, the front platform might be slightly lower and be accessible by a ramp. The teacher
seldom sits during a lecture but may wish to sit down during the examination. There should be a
chair near the table or desk for a teacher.
A lecture room should be so placed in a building that it is accessible to students without
overcrowding of corridors or stairways. Coat racks, adequate bulletin boards, lining the
corridors, and ample toilet facilities should be provided nearby. The room itself should be
arranged so that the audience can see well, hear well, and be comfortable. In part this depends on
temperature, humidity, background of light and sound, and seating space. Accessibility
provisions in classroom should be addressed.

Seating and Visibility

Good visibility depends not only on the arrangement of marker boards and of projection screen
and equipment, but also to a large degree on seating arrangements. Factor to be considered are
avoidance of obstructions, slope of the floor and height of the speaker’s platform, viewing
distance, and the extreme vertical and horizontal viewing angels. It is clear that a good lecturer
room will not have columns or supports so placed as to block the front screen and marker boards
from any seat in the room. However, when a large demonstration table stands on a platform
between the marker boards and the audience, the lower 12 to 18 inches of the board often cannot
be seen by people in the first few rows. In this case, vertically sliding marker boards are needed
so that the writing may be raised to a level where it can be seen by all.
A sloping floor in a lecture room will generally add somewhat to the cost of construction, but in
many instances it will be worth the extra cost in providing good visibility for all. The object of a
sloping floor is to make-it easier for a person to see over or around the heads of those in front
and to give the impression of a smaller room. If the seats in successive rows are staggered so
that the line of sight from one seat to the lecturer goes directly between the centers of two seatsin
the next row, the rise required per row may be reduced by half. Closely interdependent are the
slope of the floor and the height of the speaker’s platform. The use of a raised platform for the
teacher has advantages in increased visibility in any room seating more than about 40 person,
provided that the table or other furniture on the platform does not block the marker board for
those in the front rows.
Studies of distances and angles for satisfactory viewing indicate that seats should be placed at a
distance from a screen not less than 2 nor more than 6 times the width of the screen images to
be viewed and that the distance from a person to the marker board should not exceed 400 times
the size of the smallest letter or digit being written. Thus, if the back rows of students is 64 feet
away, the lecturer should make her letter and digits at least 2 inches high. Similar studies
indicate that the angle of elevation from the eye to the upper part of an object on the screen or
marker board should not exceed 30 degrees. If lecture room are built in a fan shape instead of a
rectangular shape, the minimum angle between the line of sight and the blackboard should be at
least 30 degrees and preferably more than 45 degrees. These limitations of viewing distance and
angle impose restrictions on the placement of seats for adequate viewing.