Spatial Evaluation of Primary Schools Using Biophilic Design Elements: A Multi-Criteria Decision-Making Approach

The natural environment plays a vital role in children’s health, influencing their physical, emotional, social, psychological, and spiritual well-being. Maintaining a continuous relationship with nature is essential for children and is a key consideration for professionals, such as architects, urban and interior designers, and landscape architects. School design should balance students’ abilities and environmental challenges and offer opportunities to alleviate mental fatigue, supporting sustained learning. The well-known architectural approach, biophilic, fostering a stronger connection between nature and humans, can significantly enhance students’ learning experiences and mental health in school settings. However, implementing this style in Iranian primary schools has largely been overlooked despite its potential to develop a more peaceful and dynamic environment. This research ranked several schools in northern Iran based on biophilic criteria to help authorities identify which schools require improvements. To this end, biophilic design elements in schools were identified through a literature review and provided to research experts. The most important criteria for evaluating and prioritizing options (schools) were selected based on their opinions. Subsequently, each criterion’s importance (weight) was determined using pairwise comparisons, and, finally, the schools were prioritized using the TOPSIS method.