Alumni Spotlight: Roy Sprague
Roy Sprague
Roy Sprague, AIA (BArch 1981) has changed many young lives – through architecture.
Sprague has a 40+-year career in architecture, construction and facilities management, including over 30 years in public education. Middle School No. 20 in Cypress-Fairbanks, Texas, was named Roy J. Sprague Jr. Middle School for him to honor his dedication to education throughout his career.
His career began after graduating from LSU with a Bachelor of Architecture in 1981.
“I believe that LSU truly prepared me well for my career in architecture. The five-year architecture degree was a very tough program which required significant number of hours working on architectural design projects,” Sprague said. “I had to fumble through learning time management skills in order to complete the design of each project to meet the submission deadlines we had in our architectural design labs along with our other courses we had to take to provide us a well-rounded education for the field of architecture.”
“I have many fond memories while attending LSU from 1976 to 1981. My most fond memories were the excitement and fun of LSU football weekends and attending our home games standing outside waiting in line on Saturday mornings to enter the stadium for our student seating for Saturday night games to try to obtain the best seats possible. Students would place their speakers by their windows in the stadium dormitories and played music for all the students waiting to enter the stadium,” he remembered. “There were many times I would attend the football games and then have to go back to the design lab to spend the rest of the weekend working all night in order to meet the design project deadlines.”
After graduating from LSU, Sprague served 10 years in various private sector roles for architecture and real estate development firms as project manager, construction administrator, tenant coordinator, senior tenant coordinator, A/E site representative and development coordinator before moving into public education. He was named supervisor of construction and energy for Spring ISD in 1991, where he was responsible for the overall management and coordination of the design and construction of a major building program for renovations and new construction of educational and administrative support facilities.
He came to the Cypress-Fairbanks School District (CFISD) in 1997 as the director of facilities planning and construction, managing a department of four and overseeing successful completion of a $264 million bond program in 1998. In 2001, he was promoted to senior director of facilities planning and construction. In this role, he developed the district’s standard architectural and construction contracts for all projects. He also developed districtwide facility design and construction standards for all new facilities and renovations.
Sprague was promoted to assistant superintendent of facilities and construction in 2006, a role he served in for seven years. In 2007, he took on the added responsibility of overseeing a maintenance department that included 180 employees. In 2013, he was promoted to associate superintendent of facilities, construction and support services—a role that was eventually named chief operations officer.
“He provided leadership, vision and support for the design direction, quality standards, administrative procedures and processes to develop 21st-century school designs for new construction and renovations of existing facilities,” according to the District announcement. He announced his retirement following an accomplished career effective June 2023.
Sprague has overseen the construction of more than 60% of the district’s current square footage totaling more than 11.7 million square feet. Altogether, he has completed the purchase of 41 property sites and overseen the planning and construction of 73 new facilities, which include 30 elementary, 10 middle, seven high schools, two special assignment campuses and 24 support facilities. He and his team have also handled hundreds of renovation and addition projects touching every district facility—enhancing instruction, health, and safety while providing campus equity that has impacted countless students, staff, parents and community members.
“Upon the announcement of my retirement from Cypress-Fairbanks ISD in January 2023, the proudest moment in my entire career was when the Board of Trustees approved the naming of their most recent new Middle School No. 20 as Roy J. Sprague, AIA Middle School in honor of my 26 years of dedicated service to the district with creating high performance and quality learning environments for the students we served,” he said.
“Little did I know that when we started the planning and design of this campus which is part of the Bridgeland Educational Village, that the middle school would eventually bear my name at the front entry of the building,” he said. “The educational village was a concept I was instrumental in developing with our curriculum and instruction department for the district to find more creative and flexible ways to deliver our instructional programs to increase student success.
The design concept locates an elementary, middle and high school on a multi-campus site where all three separate campuses would all be master planned in a college-like setting with shared site amenities, and outdoor learning court yards where students would be able to attend all K-12 grade levels at the same site, Sprague explained. This concept offers many opportunities for the use of shared facilities between the three campuses, collaboration and alignment with all three campus programs, mentoring opportunities with the students with each of the campuses which will help minimize the transition challenges for students going from elementary to middle school and from middle to high school.
Under his leadership, Sprague worked directly with all the district departments to develop and continually update our design guidelines and construction standards to provide high performance learning environments for the students and community. He also developed department procedures, processes and financial controls to efficiently and effectively manage the design and construction of over $5.2 billion of new construction, renovations and additions for the district over six successful bond programs, to efficiently manage the design and construction of over $5.2 billion of new construction, renovations and additions.
Sprague is a registered architect and registered interior designer with the State of Texas, and is certified by the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards. He is an Accredited Learning Environment Professional (ALEP). He is a professional member of the American Institute of Architects (AIA), Construction Specification Institute (CSI) and the Association for Learning Environments (A4LE), formerly named the Council of Educational Facilities Planners International. He is also a member of the Collaborative for High Performance Schools (CHPS), Institute for Leadership in Capital Projects (I-LinCP), Texas Association of School Administrators (TASA), Texas Association of School Business Officials (TASBO) and Association of School Business Officials (ASBO). Sprague served as the A4LE International Chairman of the Board of Directors in 2006-2007. He serves on the National Board of Directors for the Institute for Leadership in Capital Projects (I-LinCP) as well as the Collaborative of High-Performance Schools (CHPS) as Vice Chairman. He was instrumental in bringing CHPS best practices to Texas for K-12 educational facilities.
“I am deeply honored and humbled to have been selected as the namesake of Middle School No. 20,” Sprague said upon the announcement of the naming. “This distinguished honor bestowed by the Board of Trustees is certainly the pinnacle of my 42-year career. Never in my wildest dreams would I have ever imagined I would be selected to receive this highest honor in public education—being a school namesake,” he said.
“What an incredible legacy,” said fellow LSU architecture classmate Dale Songy, AIA, NCARB, principal of Coleman Partners Architects L.L.C. “He deserves the recognition. What a great guy!”
“It is an absolute privilege to have the opportunity to serve all our students and staff to provide them with high performance and quality learning environments so they can be successful in their academic years attending CFISD schools,” Sprague said. “None of this would be possible without the incredible support I received over the years from the Board of Trustees, my dedicated staff and colleagues, district partners, our CFISD community and most importantly, my family.”
For future architects, Sprague advises to explore your interests. “Architecture is a very fascinating and rewarding career with various paths that can be taken based upon your goals, skill set and experience. Your educational and work experience can lead you to various types of roles in the industry. There are those that love the designing of buildings and have a unique talent and vision for creating architectural design for various building types. You can look at specializing in a certain building type such as schools, hospitals, etc.”
“There are others that prefer the more technical side of the business where you can become an expert in specification writing and being the project architect responsible for taking the designers vision and turning it into a set of construction documents that allows general contractors to construct that vision into reality. There is also the specialty of project management to oversee the complete process from programming all the way through construction and completion of the warranty period working with all the various consultants, owners, city officials, etc.to take the project vision to reality.
“I was exposed early in my career for working for real estate developers and learning to be an owner’s representative overseeing and managing the entire process from land acquisition through the design and construction of the development. This was the route my career took back in 1986 and have been on the owner’s side ever since with utilizing my excellent architectural education from LSU and work experience to help developers and building owners create very exciting, sustainable projects to support the community.”