International French School in Singapore to Undergo Major Expansion with $80 million Project
The campus expansion will house Singapore’s first Zero Energy Kindergarten and is scheduled to be completed in Q2 2025
15 March 2023 (Singapore) – The International French School (IFS) in Singapore held a groundbreaking ceremony today, marking the official expansion of the school’s facilities, which will include the construction of a new kindergarten and an extension of the elementary school. With an estimated cost of SGD 80 million, the project will enable the school to increase its capacity to 4,000 students across K1 to 12.
Slated to be completed by mid-2025, the expansion project will include a 5-storey classroom block, an 8-storey Administration & Ancillary building, and three blocks of a 3-storey building for the new kindergarten – Singapore’s first zero energy kindergarten. The total newly built gross floor area is approximately 22,800 square metres. All new installations will be inter-connected and further linked back to existing facilities at the second storey to form a seamless circulation that is fully sheltered to mitigate environmental impacts.
“We are thrilled to begin this new chapter in the history of the International French School in Singapore. This expansion project will not only allow us to accommodate more students, but also to provide them with an exceptional learning environment that fosters creativity, innovation, and sustainability. We look forward to seeing our students thrive in these new facilities and to continue to uphold our reputation as a leading institution for French education in the region,” said David Binan, the Principal of IFS.
The new Administration block will house supporting facilities such as a sports hall, a multi-purpose hall, a 350-seat auditorium, ancillary staff offices, and a staff recreation room with a roof terrace. The kindergarten classrooms form a self-sustainable cluster for a particular age group of students, consisting of six clusters across the three blocks.
Each cluster – the Villa Concept – will have four large classrooms, one language room, one teacher room, and a large common area at the centre of the cluster.
The construction project is an extension of the elementary facilities, allowing for more students to be accommodated in elementary. This also opens more space for expanding classroom space for secondary students who will take over the current kindergarten space.
The groundbreaking ceremony was co-hosted by the Principal of IFS, David Binan together with Jean-Marc Deromedi, the President of the IFS Board. Other guests included H.E. Ms Minh-di Tang, the French Ambassador to Singapore, and H.E. Ms Iwona Piórko the Ambassador of the European Union to Singapore, along with Yves Marcel, the Executive Director of IFS.
The groundbreaking ceremony was also graced by Guest of Honour Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, the Minister for Foreign Affairs who remarked, “I want to congratulate everyone and IFS for this milestone since its establishment in 1967. IFS has grown from an initial enrollment of about 15 students to almost 3,000. We look forward to the future of more than 4,000 students in this institution. As we witness this continued progress and growth of IFS, it also reflects the strength of educational cooperation between France and Singapore,” during his speech at the event.
The expansion project takes into account the building orientation, local wind effects, solar path, and noise level, creating quality indoor and outdoor environments. Precast modular structural members and façade panels will be integrated into all the new buildings to enhance the efficiency of construction buildability.
All classroom windows in the elementary blocks are designed to be north-south oriented to minimise solar heat gain and maximise natural daylighting. The kindergarten blocks are sensitively designed at 3-storey height to blend in harmoniously with the adjacent existing 3-storey landed houses.
The learning garden on one of the block’s rooftops is an educational garden with landscape greenery, educational farming, and solar panels. It will create an active learning environment for the students to have hands-on experience with sustainability-related features.
The new development is scheduled for completion around the second quarter of 2025. Following the awarding of the tender, access to the site and the start of fencing, hoarding etc commenced in November 2022. Other key dates include today’s groundbreaking and in December 2023 completion of the super-structure.
“The new buildings have been carefully designed to promote natural ventilation and daylight opportunities, creating quality indoor and outdoor environments that support student well-being and learning. We are thrilled to be embarking on this project and look forward to its completion,” added IFS Board President, Jean-Marc Deromedi.
To learn more about the extension project, click here.
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