The school lighting innovation dilemma

This paper presents a qualitative descriptive case study that aims to build awareness about the need for improvement of the indoor environment in classrooms and to exemplify how renewal-oriented processes can be initiated. The study focuses on innovation processes that have resulted in both completely new designs and further spread of innovative solutions. The reason for the need to improve is that too many pupils and students have problems with concentration, relaxation and recuperation. The number of diagnoses such as Autism and ADHD is growing. One factor which significantly influences the pupil’s mental well-being is the daily physical environment. The single aspect which may be improved in reasonable time, at a reasonable cost, is the lighting design of classrooms. An underlying reason for the habit to continue installing insipid uniform static “light-carpets” is the lack of awareness about how lighting affects wellbeing and health. As with innovation in other industries, it is an innovation dilemma that the vast majority of the people who sell and procure classroom lighting tend to prefer the established solutions that they are used to. The article describes how Malmö’s early investment in Human Centric Lighting and the unique indoor environment of the Study hall in the Centre for Economic Sciences at Uppsala University are used as role models for lighting design in classrooms. The case study combines the authors’ own observations and earlier interviews with users. Malmö’s temporal light variation and parts of the Study hall’s lighting design are used in more than 30 classrooms, in Malmö, Stockholm Business School and Iggesund. The article concludes with suggestions on how today’s lighting design knowledge and technology can be combined to provide more advanced adaptations to the varying lighting needs of pupils, students and teachers.


Introduction
A high number of children suffer from psychological distress.Every four years the Swedish Public Health Authority studies health indicators for different ages.From 1986 to 2018 the percentages of 15year-old girls declaring that they have experienced mental disorders has increased: from 13 to 41% for feeling low, from 12 to 36% for nervousness and from 18 to 34% for sleep disorders [1].The number of persons diagnosed with neurodevelopmental disorders like Autism and ADHD is also increasing.1099 (2022) 012031 IOP Publishing doi:10.1088/1755-1315/1099/1/012031 2 While the physical environment is only one aspect that carries influence on their well-being it is relevant to note that 80 percent of the information we receive about our environment is taken in through our eyes and the visual system [2].Light affects how we perceive and understand our surroundings, improved lighting in classrooms is a cost-effective measure to enhance student well-being by design.The combination of todays' SSL, the new knowledge on light and health and the ongoing large-scale replacement of fluorescent tubes ought to be an excellent opportunity for improvement of classroom environments.However, Swedish school actors routinely continue using uniform light distribution in almost all classrooms.The ambition with this paper is to investigate the lack of action and to encourage and provide guidance for initiation of innovative transformation of lighting design in Swedish classrooms.
This paper presents a qualitative descriptive case study that aims to support buildup of awareness about today's school lighting situation and to exemplify how renewal-oriented improvement processes can be initiated.An innovation process here denotes a goal-oriented series of efforts and activities.To enhance the ability to overcome the resistance to change, it is crucial to combine innovative ways of working and utilization of today's lighting design knowledge.
The paper also discusses whether and how the lighting design in classrooms can be improved to better support well-being and health.The lighting design chapter can be read as a conceptual lightrelated "map" of environmental psychology knowledge.The theoretical overview presents some underlying sensory and psychological mechanisms behind people's interpretations of environments and situations.
We describe the processes which resulted in noted radical lighting design improvements for two educational premises.Kjellander has designed the Study hall at the Centre for Economic Sciences at Uppsala University, which received the Swedish Lighting Award 2019.The city of Malmö introduced user-adapted Human Centric Lighting already in 2015.The Study hall in Uppsala and the classroom in Malmö has served as role models and inspiration for start-up of innovative improvement processes.The process that started with the Study hall has inspired lighting design improvements at Stockholm Business School and in Iggesund.The city of Malmö has installed temporal light variation in 30 classrooms and Human Centric Lighting in three nursing homes.Götlind and Strandberg have on site insights about the installations at Uppsala University and in Malmö city respectively.The paper also builds on professional inside experiences from a city's procurements and Sweco's market development for student centered lighting design.The students' age is 13-15 years for the classroom in Malmö, 6-9 years in Iggesund and most students at Ekonomikum and Stockholm Business School are 16-20 years or older.

The Innovation Dilemma for Transformational Change
Innovation aims for value-enhancing deployment of new ideas.This means that the basic "new idea", e.g. the lighting design knowledge already exists.Invention and innovation are two different concepts.To invent something means to discover a new thing.To innovate means to make value enhancing use of already existing ideas and methods.
However, most of the companies' and society's interest in innovative development is focused on how to increase the business volume.From user value and sustainability point of view it is important to strengthen the ability "to do the right things", i.e. to improve the effectiveness.
Established businesses tend to focus on efficiency and quantitative growth.Business development for new solutions is more related to effectiveness and qualitative improvement.The difference between effectiveness and efficiency is fundamental to value creation and sustainable development.Efficiency (to do the things right) is about producing whatever somebody has chosen to produce as quickly and cheaply as possible.When you limit the perspective to efficiency, it does not matter if you produce for a throwaway society.Effectiveness (to do the right things) emphasizes the fundamental importance of making the product / solution / architecture truly useful to and appreciated by users.
For a century the main goal for the lighting sector has been to sell more light (efficiency).All incandescent lamps gave the same kind of light.The combination of today's LED and control technology enable radical improvements of the ability to get the right light, in the right place, at the right time (i.e. to improve effectiveness) [3].One innovation hurdle is that it is crucial and difficult to make the customers interested in new (unfamiliar) solutions."Businessmen will have to learn to practice "marketing" as an innovative force in itself.They have to learn that the truly new does not, as a rule satisfy demands that already exist.It creates new expectations, sets new standards, makes possible new satisfactions.'Innovative marketing' therefore creates markets.New technology always needs new markets which were not even conceivable until the new technology created new demands (Drucker 1969)" [4] Christenson's bestseller The Innovator's Dilemma [5] has brought to the fore that the resistance to change also is caused by people within companies and organizations in the established business system.It is a natural human preference to prefer to continue to use the solutions, the technology, the working methods and established documents that one already works with or have an established role in.People tend to continue to relate to the mindsets they are used to.

Lighting design and environmental psychology
Environmental psychology is multidisciplinary and focuses on how people affect and are affected by the social and physical environment [6].One basis for environmental psychology theory is how our evolution in nature has affected man as a species [7 & 8].One main aspect is the circadian variation between light and darkness and the variation of spatial light distribution.The EU project SSL-erate has shown that "Light affects our well-being and health much more than most people realize" [9].
The characteristics of light in nature is our best guidance in lighting design for wellbeing and health.Attention should not be stimulated by simply raising the level of diffuse dim lighting [10].Human Centric Lighting aims to combine visual, emotional and biological needs [11].We do not see without light, but neither do we see and feel without contrasts, shadows, direction and darkness.Sufficient darkness is vital for accent and functional lighting to be well experienced [12].
In school, pupils are expected to focus on defined tasks and avoid expression of inappropriate emotions.According to environmental psychology theory, directed attention needs regular and frequent temporary relief by contemplative fascination, such as a fire or moving water [13 & 14].Fascination is important to avoid mental fatigue and to stimulate curiosity [15].Lighting of vegetation promotes mental recuperation by observing beautiful scenery (fascination), deepened visual depth (change of environment) and emphasis on nature (shifted context) [16].Accent lighting can highlight elements in the classroom and thereby stimulate fascination.
The Prospect and Refuge theory is based on human development by natural selection.The quest for food while simultaneously avoiding risks -to see (prospect) without being seen (refuge) -is a challenge for all animals.If we lack views and/or refuge, we tend to feel stressed or uncomfortable [15].When reading people tend to prefer cozy seating [17].To be overly exposed by lighting in longer sessions tends to be stressful.
Environmental psychology emphasizes that it is vital to feel as a part of one's environmental context, to feel included.One central brain structure to this end is the Hippocampus which organizes the flow of sensory input to build memories and the utilization of earlier memories for interpretation of the situations we meet [18].It is vital to interpret one's environment, including facial expressions of other individuals, which is facilitated by combined directional overhead and lateral lighting.Concentrated light from above as the single light source will generate harsh shadows and make faces appear threatening or unnatural [10].The spectrum affects whether and how the cognitive system can interpret moods, as the oxygen level affects skin hues [19].Doubts about one's own ability to interpret what's happening creates worries and uncertainty about one´s capabilities.Such a mind-loop may be self-reinforcing [20].Visual problems to interpret the surroundings increases the risk for stress, burnout problems, anxiety and psychological distress.

Human Centric Lighting for classrooms in Malmö
The starting point for Malmö's decision to improve the school lighting was that trusted influential persons at the technical development department convinced the city to join the application for the EU project SSLerate.The ambition included a sustainable social development ambition with a similar aim as the WHO definition of health; "Health is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity."[21] The project received funding and Malmö started to look for opportunities to make a full-scale installation of Human Centric School Lighting.
A classroom was selected and organizational settings established.A user adapted light-variation scheme was developed in a master project [22].The project combined interviews about pupil's and teacher's preferences and scientific knowledge on circadian effects.The automatic control of the light aimed for slow hardly noticeable (i.e., undisturbing) variations.The design process was iterative.
The initial goal was to have a period of wake-up light in the morning.The teachers wanted to have periods with harmonious lighting in the morning and before and after lunch, because it tended to be messy in the classroom at those times.Furthermore, the color temperature is low in the afternoon to increase alertness without suppressing melatonin [23], see Figure 1.Finally, the automatic variation scheme is combined with a manual control panel for selection among predefined scenarios.
It may appear sufficient to manually adapt the light to different educational situations.However, the studies [22] indicated that teachers did not change settings and that lengthy periods of activating light caused headaches for some of the pupils.Consequently, the control system has a function for automatic return to the lighting scheme.
Figure 2 shows a classroom with traditional fluorescent tubes and the classroom with Human Centric Lighting using 60x60 panels.In both cases the light distribution is uniform.

Figure 1 Light variation scheme for Malmö's first classroom installation of "Human Centric Lighting" by means of temporal light variation.
The diagram shows the automatic variation of brightness and color temperature, during a school day.The intense wake-up light is on for 30 minutes in the morning.As an average for the day the scheme is aiming for a relatively low level of lighting.All light changes are slow and each one take at least 20 minutes.When the project started Malmö city had an ambition to find turnkey suppliers and Strandberg invited both lighting and control system companies to present their experience with the suggested type of light variation.No company was found with experience of combining the desired lighting and control.Consequently, the city's technical development department organized the installation of tunable white luminaires and the control system.Strandbergs's key objective in the dialogues to build interest within the city was to try to awaken feelings that touch the heart.
Interviews with the teachers and students indicate that the installation and light variation are appreciated.[22] Sleep studies indicate that the installations have a positive circadian entrainment effect [24].Strandberg emphasizes that Malmö is using tunable white 60x60-panels panels with high quality diffusers and that they do not have problems with glare.LED light has a reputation of being too intense and glary.Lighting designers tend to dislike LED and 60x60 panels.The reason seems to be the disapproval of only roof lighting and uniform static light distribution.This is highly relevant in relation to the emotional significance of the visibility of accent lighting effects.
The EU-project SSLerate attracted international media interest and then local media became very interested in the installation in Malmö.The Nobel Price 2017 related to the importance of circadian mechanisms [25] also increased the interest in temporal light variation.The city introduced user-adapted circadian light variation in 2015 and has up until now installed temporal light variation in 30 classrooms and Human Centric Lighting with more homelike lighting in three nursing homes.

The Study hall at the Centre for Economic Sciences, Ekonomikum, Uppsala University
The university print shop was closed down and Ekonomikum was left with two empty basement premises.Meanwhile there was an urgent need for more study areas.The aim was to create an attractive environment despite being in a basement without daylight, actually in an active bomb shelter.
The vision was to create a room with interior and lighting design to support various study situations with diverse seating positions and study tools, digital as well as analogue.Lighting should be possible to adjust to suit personal preferences and contribute to a calm, contemplative and pleasant atmosphere.The furnishing together with the lighting signalize a quiet space for mainly individual reading and working situations.Successively lifted floor levels from center to sides offers a good overview.Surrounding a central fireplace there are 14 specially designed armchairs.The fireplace is a point of focus visible from nearly all seats in the room with light from the gas-flames creating a cozy atmosphere and a relaxing distant eye-rest between long straining sessions of looking at books and screens.
The circular seating is also intended for conversation occasions, with optimal physical conditions and a size not larger than enabling to hear and to read facial expression and body language across the circle.Gathering around the campfire is obviously the archetype of meeting and quality conversation in all cultures through history.
The design of the Study hall reuses some of the design elements from Matildelund preschool, awarded with the Swedish Lighting Award 2012 [26], in particular the Reading-refuges.One of Kjellander´s ambitions is to understand architecture from the child's perspective, i.e., related to the child's own perceptions and understandings.A refuge which attracts children is pleasant also for adults.
The design process was an iterative and interactive process that included dialogue with customers and user representatives and about the different partial solutions that suppliers suggested.Götlind and Kjellander made an initial draft that was presented to the board of Ekonomikum.The proposal was appreciated, but the investment cost was too high.An application for central funding from the university's strategic funds was made.In order for the application to be granted, the project needed to be anchored at all levels within the organization -a time-consuming but necessary process to reach the goal.The time from idea to decision was about three years.After another three years, the premises were inaugurated.During the dialogues, Kjellander presented his vision to the users and suppliers so they could better articulate their needs and deliveries respectively.The installation received the Swedish Lighting Award in 2019.The jury's motivation: The Study halls lighting design demonstrates advanced insights about lighting interaction with color, shape and material.The project has been carried out with great passion and expertise on study environments, and belief in the young individual and his/her rightful claim to dignity.Function, sensory experience and atmosphere are integrated by the ergonomic and innovative treatment of light.Darkness plays an obvious role in the design and creates focus.With great courage and creativity, the lighting designer stages original means of expression for experiencing safety, familiarity and wonder to enhance the feeling of well-being in this unique learning environment.[27] Translation Tove Karlsson The Study Hall is very popular and also attracts students from other parts of the university.It is often rather filled and many students arrive early to catch their favorite seats.The cleaners want to delay the opening to 07:00 am, to be able to clean.Götlind has observed that the mood is more harmonious also in other parts of Ekonomikum.The users of the study hall seem to spread the experienced harmony.Pictures from and descriptions of the Studyhall are used as vital parts in the marketing of the Centre for Economic Sciences.The interest in the Study hall influences the impression of Uppsala University.Through national and international study visits, the premises have provided inspiration for planning of other educational facilities.
Kjellander's design of the Study hall aims for a holistic combination of architecture, interiors, lighting design and equipment that meets the users different and varying functional and emotional needs.The CIE concept "Integrative Lighting" also suggest early integration of lighting and architecture [28].Some of Kjellander's design concepts for the Studyhall are reused for a Conversation-room, Figure 4 and in classrooms, Figure 5, at Stockholm School of Economics and for current installations in a classroom at Iggesundsskolan, Figure 6.These installations also have a user-centered design ambition.Some design concepts that have been reused are the low level of general lighting, the spatial variation of the light, the round shape, the fire to attract spontaneous attention, the reading refuges and the variety of seating opportunities.
The Conversation-room and the classrooms in figures 5 and 6 all have a low level of general lighting.The Conversation-room has 12 seats and is primarily intended for dialogue.Some of the classrooms at Stockholm School of Economics, figure 5, have curved desks which provide a more social and interactive atmosphere compared to normal rows of desks where students are facing the backs of others.The lighting will be improved, aiming for spatial variation and highlighting the art cabinets.The study compartments are designed as in the Study hall at Uppsala University.
The lighting design for the classroom at Iggesundsskolan includes a panel for manual selection between lighting for different forms of activities, e.g.reflective dialogue and focused individual work, Figure 6

Discussion
The initial installation in Malmö has a scientific basis in the knowledge about the awakening effect of intense blue light and was developed in dialogue with researchers in an EU-project.The lighting design for the Study hall at the Centre Economic Sciences has received the Swedish Lighting Award.Strandberg and Götlind have on site insights from contacts with the usage of the facilities.During the Ekonomikum design process Kjellander was working four years with gradual buildup of mutual understanding, about the holistic interior design.Malmö's temporal light variation was designed in a master project that included dialogues and interviews with the teachers and pupils [22].This paper does not compare the lighting design for these installations.The overarching ambition is to describe the broadening innovative deployment processes that have been inspired by the interest in the initial installations.
The intended transformation of school lighting is dependent on a spectrum of different kinds of innovation processes.At one side there is a need to get started with radical improvements, as exemplified by the Study hall and the first installation in Malmö.At the other side of the spectrum there is a need to deploy further copies of earlier innovative solutions, like Malmö's additional installations of classroom lighting with temporal light variation.To build interest in a new kind of solution it is important to have access to full-scale installations that can be demonstrated.It is also very valuable to have access to persons that are using and can tell about their own experience of the new kind of solution.Most school lighting installations does not involve a lighting designer nor dialogue with the users of the installation.Teachers etc. are not used to be involved in preparations of specifications for procurement of lighting.
As a team leader for the city's implementation of new ICT, I am convinced that there is great technical potential to flexibly vary the light in user-adapted ways.The innovation dilemma is that it is difficult to involve teachers etc. in dialogue about the varying goals for the lighting in the classrooms.

Olle Strandberg
To build mutual understanding between designers and user representatives there is need for open dialogue.To enable further development, it is interesting to combine parts from an already introduced solution with renewal oriented use of further improvement ideas and new technology.
The intended transformation of school lighting is dependent on a spectrum of different kinds of innovation processes.At one side there is a need to get started with radical improvements, as exemplified by the Study hall and the first installation in Malmö.At the other side of the spectrum there is a need to deploy further copies of earlier innovative solutions, like Malmö's additional installations of classroom lighting with temporal light variation.To build interest in a new kind of solution it is important to have full-scale installations that can be demonstrated.It is also very valuable to have accesses to persons that are using and can tell about their own experience of the new kind of solution.Most school lighting installations does not involve a lighting designer nor dialogue with the users of the installation.Teachers etc. are not used to be involved in preparations of specifications for procurement of lighting.
One key factor that initiated and enabled the innovative processes for the Malmö schools and related to the Study hall was that experienced trusted professionals took own initiatives.To motivate people to engage as change agents it is not sufficient to describe the advantages of the new solution.It is also necessary to clarify the shortcomings of the established standard.However, it is difficult to awaken interest in light variation among persons that are used to think that uniform stable light is preferable.
A basic characteristic of life is the constant oscillations between wakedness and sleep, work and rest, as well as taking in and digesting information.The 24-hour circadian cycle is one aspect.Environmental psychology stresses that we have a need for more frequent variation between activating and restorative experiences.In comparison to the living natures multifaceted variations, one might say that the uniform static lighting that is used in almost all classrooms gives a feeling that the pupil's environment is dead.
The ambition to provide the right light, in the right place, at the right time, is difficult to combine with today's standards and habits.It is easier to specify and procure a traditional lighting solution.One critical aspect of standardization is the influence on innovation.Standardization like the CIE concept Integrative lighting may be important to open up for deployment of new solutions.On the other hand, established standards tend to impede deployment of renewal oriented solutions.
Renewal can be driven by industrial companies investing in development of more products to increase their market.Tunable white given the opportunity to change CT and intensity, which is used for the classroom installations in Malmö.However, this is hardly affecting spatial light variation, since light distribution is a design variable [29].Producers only invest in improving their own product portfolios.Lighting design companies are normally much smaller and sell their competence directly to the end customers.In most classroom projects no lighting designer is involved.The user involvement in the first Malmö classroom installation and for the Study hall in Uppsala has built awareness.There is a need to develop renewal-oriented lighting design concepts and descriptions which touch the heart.
It is a social sustainability issue that most schools continue to use class-room lighting that is neither stimulating, nor recuperative.The investment cost for user adapted light variation is practically negligible in comparison to the long-term costs when pupils get stuck in developmental problems.During the SSLerate project Strandberg often said that "if Human Centric Lighting can save only one pupil from lifelong exclusion from society, it is definitely worthwhile to invest in significantly better lighting".

Possible further design developments
The authors' observations and the jury's Lighting Award motivation for the Study hall show that significant emotive advantages have been achieved by combination of individually controllable luminaires, low general lighting, spatial light variation, the starry sky roof lights and the fire that attracts spontaneous attention.The lighting design and an advanced interior design with round shape, reading refuges and a variety of seating opportunities has been developed in concert.The lighting equipment is a minor part of the cost and parts of the Study hall lighting design can be adapted for classrooms.The Study hall demonstrates a rich holistic mixture of inspirational ideas.The emotional pleasure of being in the Study hall shows that it is possible to create attractive room, also in windowless basements -in fact it seems as if this falls more naturally when darkness can be used as a starting point.
Among lighting designers, it is well known that general lighting must be limited in order for accent lighting to be well experienced.There is a positive correlation between the psychological advantages of reduced general lighting and energy saving.Furthermore, eye problems among children and adolescents, partly caused by spending long periods watching a screen at close range, are increasing.This indicates that there is too little sensory stimulus to refocus and observe more distant objects.One way of dealing with this is to create sightlines towards accent-lighted sensory-stimulating details.The fireplace and the fiber optic star ceiling, in the Study hall, captures spontaneous attention and let the eyes rest.
One possible further development is to make combined use of various aspects from different installations, e.g., accent lighting with the kind of lighting zones applied in Malmö and at Iggesund.Analogous to the lux and CT variation in figure 1 it is technically feasible to achieve a periodically stronger visualization of certain objects by coordinated temporal variation of accent lighting, functional lighting and general lighting.

Conclusion
The main innovation dilemma for classroom lighting is that the lighting design knowledge on how to vary the light to improve emotional wellbeing is not used.When nothing specific is stated about light variation the general practice is to install uniform light-carpets with relatively high illumination levels.
The presented installations and processes show that it is achievable to make innovative fullscale school installations with radical lighting design improvements.Malmö's first full-scale installation of Human Centric Lighting awoke an interest to make additional installations.The Study hall is receiving successively more visitors.The increasing number of related installations shows that full-scale role models can inspire start-up of innovative deployment processes.Renewal oriented installations are important as showcases to build awareness about the relation between light and health.

Figure 2
Figure 2 Traditional classroom lighting (left) and Human Centric Lighting (right) with 60x60 panels, temporal light variation and 5000K color temperature when photographed.Photo Olle Strandberg

Figure 3
Figure 3  The Study hall at The Centre for Economic Sciences, Uppsala University Photo: Mikael Silkeberg

Figure 5 Figure 6
Figure 5 Classroom at the Stockholm School of Economics.The curved interior design (left) as well as the wall with individual reading refuges (right) are inspired by the Study hall in Uppsala.Photo Åsa Machado

Figure 4
Figure 4 The round Conversation-room at Stockholm School of Economics.Photo Jonas Kjellander