Objective and subjective criteria regarding the effect of sunlight and daylight in classrooms

Abstract

Daylight and sunlight in classrooms are important parameters that affect health, emotions, and academic performance of the students as well as the energy consumption of the school building. The present work is based on the general concept of Post Occupancy Evaluation Studies (POEs), combining both objective observations and subjective reporting by the occupants. In order to extract useful information about the effect of daylighting strategies, a series of measurements and observations were carried out in twenty classrooms in three different towns in Greece. In this case, the objective observations consist of geometric assessment of the rooms and the fenestration, creation of a data basis of the shading devices and measurements of daylight levels combined with measurements of the transparency of the curtains used in the classrooms under examination. The subjective reporting derived from a short questionnaire used in nine of the twenty classrooms and from records of the teachers’ comments. The aim has been to identify the side effects of daylight use and sunlight penetration in classrooms, such as the annoying presence of sunlight on the desks and the extensive use of curtains, in order to overcome them in the future by means of innovative fenestration arrangements and design.