Lee Pulaski, lpulaski@wolfrivermedia.com
Leader Photo by Lee Pulaski Shower facilities in the student locker rooms are in horrible shape and are unused by students, with some areas serving as storage. Facilities director Jeff Easter describes them as “something you’d see in a horror movie.”
Leader Photo by Lee Pulaski Steam boilers in the basement at Shawano Community Middle School were installed in the 1960s, and it is getting increasingly difficult to find parts to keep them functioning. School district officials want to replace the steam boilers with a hot water system and plan to ask voters for the funding in November.
Much of the infrastructure at Shawano Community Middle School is old enough to qualify for AARP benefits.
That’s why Shawano School District officials are considering a referendum in November to provide the needed face-lift to keep the institution going for at least another 25 or 30 years.
Estimated costs of a referendum are unknown, as the district awaits final numbers from Somerville, an architectural firm out of Green Bay. The estimate is expected to be in the School Board’s hands by August.
“We’re hoping, with the right information and with people seeing the value of what we’re doing, the community will support this,” district facilities director Jeff Easter said.
Despite not knowing the costs, district officials know what areas of the middle school desperately need updating.
The key project will be replacing steam boilers installed in the 1960s with a modern hot water system that will more efficiently heat the building.
“They’re working. They’re not efficient, but they’re working,” Easter said of the boilers. “They still have all the original equipment on them, and it’s very hard to find parts for those.”
The pipes that send the steam throughout the school only had a life span of 50 years. Repairing them would be extremely expensive, Easter said.
A new system would enable the district to install a cooling system for the whole building. SCMS currently has air conditioning only in the main office, library and a couple of other rooms.
Easter speculated that the heating system alone could cost the district around $3.5 million, but officials have other projects in mind, as well, to better utilize the existing square footage. They include the following:
• Both the boys and girls locker rooms need to be updated. Easter said they are severely outdated, do not comply with the Americans With Disabilities Act and are constructed in a way that limits teachers’ ability to supervise students. The lockers are too small and set up awkwardly, he said.
The showers are outdated and not used. Easter said they look like “something you’d see in a horror movie.”
• The existing concessions area is about the size of a closet, and the school’s parent-teacher organization has used the commons area to sell snacks during school basketball games. Easter said he would like to expand the concession area.
• The commons also needs to be expanded, according to Easter. The limited space requires the school to have three lunch periods to accommodate all students, and even then, meal time is limited.
“The kids just have to slam their food and go,” Easter said.
• To expand the commons, the school’s main entryway, visitor center and school offices would be realigned, and an oddly shaped classroom would be eliminated.
The office shift would also allow the school nurse to be in the same area as administrators. SCMS is the only school in the district where the nurse’s office is detached from the main office, according to Easter.
• More access points are needed for SCMS to utilize its courtyard area for studying and outdoor learning. Plans include reducing the size of a speech pathology classroom, which Easter reported is too large for the professional’s needs, to create a hallway to the courtyard.
• The school kitchen would get more space for cold storage. Space is so limited now that food is transported daily from Shawano Community High School.
• The school’s weight and fitness rooms are only accessible by stairs, so the district is looking to install an elevator. The two rooms would be combined into one.
• Single-stall bathrooms in the wing where technology education, band, orchestra and choir classes are taught would be expanded to be ADA compliant.
• The music rooms would be renovated to allow more access to practice rooms, as well as to improve the acoustics.
• Easter also anticipates removing some asbestos tiling and replacing some light fixtures if the referendum is approved. Most of the flooring would be left alone, he said, since it had been replaced in the 1990s and is still in good condition.
“When I started working here 2 1/2 years ago, I realized we needed to figure out what we were going to do with this building,” Easter said. “There were a lot of questions as far as the structure of the building and was it worth investing money in.
“The structure itself is in very good shape, and the opinions we received from others is that it will continue to serve us for a period of time. We’re hoping for at least another 30 years.”