Explorative Pathways for Innovative Careers (EPIC) Campus

Purpose and Approach

The Explorative Pathways for Innovative Careers (EPIC) Campus, located in Littleton, Colorado, exemplifies how nontraditional approaches to secondary education can successfully respond to

the profound economic, technological, and climactic changes transforming the future. According to Bloomberg, “60% of new jobs created in the next decade will be in fields that don’t typically require a college degree.” Now more than ever, students and their families expect schools to provide career guidance and mentorship, industry-focused skills and training, and hands-on experiences that facilitate a seamless transition from school to employment. Today, EPIC is an adaptable living laboratory inside and out. The school fosters personal and professional development for students with dynamic, flexible, and healthy environments that support educational goals, environmental stewardship, and community involvement.

From the start, when Littleton community voters passed a $298 bond to finance vital investments in the school district’s capital infrastructure, there was a desire for a new technical education campus to expand student opportunities and choice with additional career pathways. The team saw this as an opportunity to reimagine curricula and campus environments, designing them in tandem to maximize benefits for the community after a robust and inclusive planning process. Three groups were formed to organize and collect diverse community voices: a Littleton Public Schools Advisory team made up of the Superintendent, COO, CEO, innovation leaders, and district principals, and a Design Advisory Group (DAG) made up of students, parents, industry partners, and local Authorities Having Jurisdiction (AHJs).

Despite challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the design team guided the stakeholders through listening sessions, workshops, and steering committee meetings in which they formed key principles to guide the design: community, ecology, beauty, biophilia, universal access, and responsible water use. They also created a shared vision for the campus to be ”a transformational space that opens possibilities for all students, empowering them to remain curious, acquire skills and knowledge, and take risks in learning while maximizing opportunities.”

The project’s success lies in its expansive and holistic approach. By developing regenerative systems and fostering mutually beneficial relationships, the EPIC Campus maximizes well-being for individuals, communities, and the planet. It embodies a vision of education that is dynamic, inclusive, and deeply connected to the natural world.

Context and Role

The EPIC project transformed a former car dealership into a state-of-the-art educational hub, showcasing the enormous potential in adaptive reuse and regenerative design for learning environments. Conveniently located across from Little High School and easily accessible via major roadways, the 5-acre site consisted of two buildings, a sea of asphalt and landscape buffers of bluegrass lawn with mature trees along the south and east edges. The design team was tasked with reusing two existing structures and reimagining a parking lot into a space to foster innovative learning, promote community, and restore ecological systems.

Creating a state-of-the-art educational facility on the site posed unique environmental challenges for the landscape architect. Storm water from the existing impervious parking lots drained directly into the nearby Big Dry Creek severely degrading water quality, harming ecosystems, and threatening community health. After a comprehensive site analysis, including researching the property’s ecological history, the landscape architect recognized a rich opportunity to allow students to learn from regenerative design in action by building a living plaza for stormwater management in the space between the site’s two existing buildings. Before Littleton was developed, a tributary of Big Dry Creek once moved through the center of the site. Rather than create a hidden impoundment as is commonly used to temporarily hold stormwater, the landscape architect and civil engineer designed an innovative, centrally located plaza that deployed a holistic, nature-based system to collect, absorb, and filter stormwater. Pathways Plaza, named in honor of the curriculum, incorporates native and bioregional adaptive plantings, and transplanted trees, and effective low carbon hardscape alternatives such as recycled concrete pavers, impermeable pavers and stone aggregate. Built features like a Kinetic Plaza Trench and a salvaged steel runnel direct rooftop water into the porous landscape detention (PLD).

The role of the landscape architect was to integrate nature positive infrastructure with a unifying and compelling design. The permeable surfaces of the plaza contribute to stormwater management while supporting a wide variety of outdoor activities for students, staff, employer partners, and the broader community. The courtyard steel structures provide a way for Construction Trades students to earn OSHA certifications and will support a future solar array for students to analyze. Students from the Natural Resources Career Pathway embrace the plaza as a living laboratory that supports courses in plant science, conservation ecology, and water quality management—even offering stormwater management certification.

Designed to absorb and hold the water from a 100-year storm, Pathways Plaza educates the community about the water cycle and how systems designed today have long-term implications for our environment. Schools like EPIC Campus are critical to helping students face the unique social, economic, and environmental issues they are likely to encounter in the future.

Significance and Unique Elements

The EPIC project showcases how landscape architecture is transforming STEM disciplines by elevating regenerative design collaboratively with architects and engineers. Adaptive reuse of the existing car dealership offered tremendous benefits saving 29% kgCO2e of materials from landfill. From the demolished portion of the West Building, 5 tons of steel were salvaged and repurposed onsite for drainage elements and security bollards. EPIC’s distinctive design resulted in a remarkable transformation, uniting the buildings and site to create a cohesive campus environment.

The EPIC Campus landscape features unique elements that provide opportunities for hands-on learning in plant science, ecology, and sustainable agriculture. A repurposed shipping container retrofitted for hydroponic food production provides a lab space for students in the Natural Resources Pathway in which they study how to reduce water use and grow produce rapidly. Harvests have yielded approximately 50 pounds of greens per week, enabling students to donate significantly to a nearby café that has a pay-what-you-can approach to providing food for the community.

Pathways Plaza’s design also preserved an open plot in front of the hydroponics farm for teachers and students to learn about landscape design and take ownership. A partnership with Denver Botanic Gardens and a local landscaping firm guided students through the planning and execution of a pollinator garden. They learned how to use scientific data to restore and protect the native ecosystem with strategies like composting to enhance soil quality and selecting plants that reduce water use and provide food for pollinators. Beehives and beekeeping management are the latest additions to the campus, in an environment that will continue to encourage, catalyze, and support new educational experiences.

The focus was not only on professional growth. Pathways Plaza also attends to the role landscape design can plan to promote health and wellbeing for its students. A nature trail, weaving through mature trees preserved from the existing site, offers a serene escape, enhancing stress relief and promoting a connection with nature for all. Combined with flexible outdoor learning spaces, teachers and students are continually enticed to move out-doors, activating movement, and connection with nature.

After its first year of serving students, EPIC has had a profound impact on its entire community. Students have had the opportunity to explore, grow, and train in environments that closely replicate real-world conditions and gain exposure to industry professionals who are experts in their field. Beyond its role as a career and technical campus, EPIC has been a lively gathering space, engaging industry partners and the wider community. This inclusive approach ensures the campus can remain relevant to the community in the face of future challenges and needs, serving as a community resource for innovation and collaboration. Schools like EPIC Campus are critical to helping students face the unique social, economic, and environmental issues they are likely to encounter in the future.