Evaluation of environmental comfort conditions in public schools: a case study in Arapiraca-AL
Environmental comfort; public schools; perception of users.
Since the 1970s, there has been an increase in the number of Brazilian schools, mainly in public schools. However, the lack of resources, associate with the great demand of these educational institutions, caused projects to be replicated without due attention to the local climate, user comfort and bioclimatic strategies. It was from the 1990s that studies began to be carried out in Brazil, making approaches within the school environment and raising the ideal conditions for teaching practice, as well as studying how uncomfortable environments impact the students' full learning, in some cases, may even trigger certain pathologies. It is of the utmost importance that the physical structure of schools provides the necessary means for an adequate exchange of knowledge within the classroom. It is within these environments that students spend a large part of their day, in many cases, taking full-time classes, and therefore, already have some kind of psychological wear and tear caused by the long hours of class. In this way, the research sought to explore the main environmental variables within the classrooms of three schools located in the city of Arapiraca-Alagoas. The thermal comfort data that were collected were air temperature and air humidity. The acoustic surveys measured the sound pressure levels inside and outside the rooms. In the light measurements, the ambient lighting levels were recorded. In addition to environmental measurements, data were also collected regarding the physical structure of schools. Through the analysis of the data collected, we have preliminary results that the physical structure of these environments is not conducive to the practice of teaching.