Key activity 1: Development of
maintenance and user manuals
As construction draws to a close, attention should turn
to maintenance and future use of the school. The design
team and construction workers best understand the
building materials and structural system. They should
draft a schedule for maintenance. For example, how often
the roof cover should be repaired or replaced, when to
re-plaster or paint walls, when floors and windows may
need replacements, and how often latrines need to be
emptied. While the maintenance manual may be an
extensive reference document, the school management
committee needs simpler checklists so that maintenance
staff can perform routine work and school staff can monitor
maintenance activities over time.
Maintaining safe schools incur costs. When MoEs or MoPWs
oversee school maintenance, school management committees
should establish the maintenance schedule and determine
what funds, from which sources, will be allocated to these
activities. Government agencies may seek to coordinate the
school maintenance with other sites to increase efficiencies
and cost savings across their jurisdiction.
Also needed are user manuals, covering permissible usage
and alteration to the building. For government-run schools,
usage is typically the responsibility of the MoE or their district
offices. These agencies need to indicate if the building
can be used as shelter in times of crisis or for community
activities after school hours.
The government authority should, in consultation with the
design team, also specify which aspects of the building and
grounds the school staff can alter without seeking further
approval. As needs change, staff may naturally want to
modify the school but such actions can seriously endanger
the lives of students and staff. Adding or removing doors,
walls, floors, columns and beams is particularly concerning.
Changes to the site, such as removing vegetation, can
also alter drainage or increase erosion around school
foundations. The user manual should stipulate when
modifications need approval, technical review or both.
The user manual serves as the written, institutional memory
for the school building and grounds. As such, it should include
any results from the site investigation and hazard assessment
completed during the Planning Stage. If alterations are
made, the manual should be updated to reflect the changes.
Key activity 2: School completion
and handover
SECTION III: POST-CONSTRUCTION
87
The completion of a safer school should be a communitywide celebration. These projects are not merely about the
construction but also about strengthening a community’s
ability to engage as equal partners in their own development
and in providing a safer and more resilient community for
their children.
Commemoration of the completion of a safe school should
go beyond thanking donors and welcoming students. It
can and should be a time where the safety of the structure
is noted and the community acknowledges the decisions
and actions that led to this safety. The message of the
commemoration should clearly focus on how safetyconscious choices about site, design and construction
resulted in a school that protects children and remains an
educational resource even after a disaster.
The handover has both legal and celebratory aspects:
• The contractor should first hand over the school to
the contract holder – the implementing actor funding
the school construction – by submitting a completion
certificate. The contract holder should sign the certificate
after ensuring the work is completed to the desired
standards.
Where the community has been heavily involved in the
construction process or community monitoring, the
completion certificate signing should be an important
event where all acknowledge the effort and dedication
needed to complete a safe school. Safety features of
the school should be identified through guided tours or
photo presentations. Ideally these features should be
permanently highlighted and notated so the community
has a constant reminder of safety.
• When the contract holder is not a government agency,
the completed school should then be passed to the
appropriate local government agency for formal steps to
open the school. The agency needs to add the school
to national and sub-national databases and task local
emergency services with reviewing the school and
integrating it into their disaster management procedures.
On the operational side, the government agency needs to
assign students and staff to the site and provide operation
and maintenance funds. School boards or other oversight
committees may also need to be established or ratified.
• The final handover is to the school community – to the
principals, management committees or school boards.
As they begin operating the school, they should continue
maintaining the commitment to safety that began with the
construction of a safe school building. They should define
the roles and responsibilities for monitoring deterioration
and repairing it. They should also complete any nonstructural mitigation needed to protect students and staff
from the dangers posed by the school’s interior contents.
To maintain safety during operations, the school staff
should also address Pillar 2 and 3 of the Comprehensive
School Safety Framework. They should establish a
standing committee and give it the task of coordinating
school disaster management with key internal and external
stakeholders.