Post by title1parent on May 28, 2009 4:31:13 GMT -5
www.suburbanchicagonews.com/napervillesun/news/1595279,D203-classes-renovation_na052709.article
D203 classes to go on despite renovation
May 28, 2009
By TIM WALDORF twaldorf@scn1.com
Remember those T-shirts worn by Naperville Central High School students that said the school is "our dump."
Margarita Altidis, who will be Central's senior class president next year, does.
"The building can be deceiving," she told those gathered Wednesday afternoon for a ground breaking ceremony at the school. "Because what goes on inside this school is priceless."
Naperville School District 203 is set to start an $87.7 million expansion and renovation project at Naperville Central this summer. The largest and most challenging project called for in the $115 million facility improvement plan voters approved last spring, it provides for roughly 170,000 square feet of new space and 370,000 square feet of renovations.
For retiring District 203 Superintendent Alan Leis, it all started with those science facilities. They just weren't adequate, he said.
But it won't stop with new science labs.
The completed facility will include new global communication and research learning environments, as well as new athletic and wellness spaces. Existing science lab spaces will be converted into a fine arts and music win, and existing cafeteria space will be turned into a new library and media center.
An exterior courtyard will be enclosed by the construction of a three-story academic wing that will encircle a new student cafeteria and commons space. Parking and traffic circulation will be adjusted and mechanical, electrical, plumbing and technology infrastructure will see extensive upgrades.
The entire project is scheduled to be completed as a multi-phase project in 2011, during which time classes will go on.
So, noted Lynne Nolan, Naperville Central's activities dean, people may have to deal with "concrete floors, partial walls, and weird vibrations in the middle of math class," but, when it is all over, the community will have a building befitting its exceptional students.
Leis expressed similar sentiments.
"It is going to be difficult," he said. "There's going to be a lot of dust and dirt. Things won't go perfectly in terms of that.
"Not many people decide to spend three years renovating a building at the same time they're running a school in the same building that they're renovating as they move kids around and whatever," he added.
But as Altidis noted, there is much to be proud of already considering the school's limitations. Principal Bill Wiesbrook rattled off just a few of the "priceless" things that have gone on inside the school of late.
Vocal and instrumental music students won numerous awards "in spite of having to haul their equipment from the music area back and forth from the auditorium and the practice fields, and in spite of their very undersized facilities."
Central's athletic department took first place in the DuPage Valley Conference's overall athletic competition for the second consecutive year "in spite of having a six-lane track, when we're supposed to have an eight-lane track, and no indoor track, and a football stadium that can't be used for practice."
Its math team finished second in the state "despite undersized classrooms, math classrooms in a mobile building and math classrooms scattered around the school."
And 23 of its students were named National Merit Scholars, achieving their success "in spite of undersized science classrooms and undersized science labs."
"Those are just a few examples of the many successes that our students have achieved in spite of our current facility," Wiesbrook said. "And I'm very excited, and I'm looking forward to our students in a couple of years having a well-deserved and much-improved facility, and I'm looking forward to the successes and achievements to come."
"This school achieves, and these students achieve — and buildings do not a school make," Leis said. "But it just seems to me, for the future of this community, for the future of education, it was really important that we had an adequate facility."
"We're in for a difficult three years, but I am so pleased as I am getting ready to leave the district that this day is here. I just wanted to make sure it started, and that I was able to do."
D203 classes to go on despite renovation
May 28, 2009
By TIM WALDORF twaldorf@scn1.com
Remember those T-shirts worn by Naperville Central High School students that said the school is "our dump."
Margarita Altidis, who will be Central's senior class president next year, does.
"The building can be deceiving," she told those gathered Wednesday afternoon for a ground breaking ceremony at the school. "Because what goes on inside this school is priceless."
Naperville School District 203 is set to start an $87.7 million expansion and renovation project at Naperville Central this summer. The largest and most challenging project called for in the $115 million facility improvement plan voters approved last spring, it provides for roughly 170,000 square feet of new space and 370,000 square feet of renovations.
For retiring District 203 Superintendent Alan Leis, it all started with those science facilities. They just weren't adequate, he said.
But it won't stop with new science labs.
The completed facility will include new global communication and research learning environments, as well as new athletic and wellness spaces. Existing science lab spaces will be converted into a fine arts and music win, and existing cafeteria space will be turned into a new library and media center.
An exterior courtyard will be enclosed by the construction of a three-story academic wing that will encircle a new student cafeteria and commons space. Parking and traffic circulation will be adjusted and mechanical, electrical, plumbing and technology infrastructure will see extensive upgrades.
The entire project is scheduled to be completed as a multi-phase project in 2011, during which time classes will go on.
So, noted Lynne Nolan, Naperville Central's activities dean, people may have to deal with "concrete floors, partial walls, and weird vibrations in the middle of math class," but, when it is all over, the community will have a building befitting its exceptional students.
Leis expressed similar sentiments.
"It is going to be difficult," he said. "There's going to be a lot of dust and dirt. Things won't go perfectly in terms of that.
"Not many people decide to spend three years renovating a building at the same time they're running a school in the same building that they're renovating as they move kids around and whatever," he added.
But as Altidis noted, there is much to be proud of already considering the school's limitations. Principal Bill Wiesbrook rattled off just a few of the "priceless" things that have gone on inside the school of late.
Vocal and instrumental music students won numerous awards "in spite of having to haul their equipment from the music area back and forth from the auditorium and the practice fields, and in spite of their very undersized facilities."
Central's athletic department took first place in the DuPage Valley Conference's overall athletic competition for the second consecutive year "in spite of having a six-lane track, when we're supposed to have an eight-lane track, and no indoor track, and a football stadium that can't be used for practice."
Its math team finished second in the state "despite undersized classrooms, math classrooms in a mobile building and math classrooms scattered around the school."
And 23 of its students were named National Merit Scholars, achieving their success "in spite of undersized science classrooms and undersized science labs."
"Those are just a few examples of the many successes that our students have achieved in spite of our current facility," Wiesbrook said. "And I'm very excited, and I'm looking forward to our students in a couple of years having a well-deserved and much-improved facility, and I'm looking forward to the successes and achievements to come."
"This school achieves, and these students achieve — and buildings do not a school make," Leis said. "But it just seems to me, for the future of this community, for the future of education, it was really important that we had an adequate facility."
"We're in for a difficult three years, but I am so pleased as I am getting ready to leave the district that this day is here. I just wanted to make sure it started, and that I was able to do."
