Three juniors enrolled in Ms. Karin Miller-Lewis’s Global Arts and History class presented their work this week to the Northeast Regional Conference of the Association for Learning Environments, an interdisciplinary association of professionals focused on the evolution of learning environments. Roman Kimuyu ’25, Leo Lee ’25, and Liam Rausch ’25 spoke via Zoom to the conference’s attendees about how Regis’s landmarked building promotes a sense of belonging.

Students in the Global Arts and History class study cultural traditions from around the world and how they’ve changed over time. The class includes an architecture unit in which students look specifically at Regis’s building on 84th Street. Students are asked to consider how the building’s design represents the school’s ideas and ideals, as well as how they interact with it on a daily basis.

Each year, the juniors in the class are challenged to consider how Regis’s physical space meets the needs of students in a particular area; this year, students looked at how the building encourages a sense of belonging. They investigated what the building was designed for when it opened in 1914, looked at which spaces encourage community today, and made proposals that might further enhance that community.

The students were invited to present their work by architect Serena Lozonczy, who previously had worked on architectural plans for renovations to the school.