Following the passage of an $88 million bond proposal in early August, the Berkley School District is proceeding with their plans to renovate and improve the eight schools within the district. Of that sum, nearly $50 million is earmarked for the BHS campus. When asked about why the bond was needed, BSD superintendent Scott Francis said that the driving force behind the bond was that “the previous bond in 2015 primarily tackled urgent issues behind our walls and floors. But it wasn’t able to provide new furniture, athletics, or performing arts upgrades. We want to finish the work addressed in our 2014 Needs Assessment that we couldn’t tackle during the 2015 bond. It’s time our facilities matched our award-winning programming.”
With the new funds, the district will replace all office and classroom furniture, finally doing away with the 30+ year old desks and chairs. The new furniture will be flexible to allow for more uses in classrooms, such as desks having tops made of whiteboard material and having backpack hangers on the sides. As a way to show the functionality the new furniture will bring, the students in Mrs. Sandtveit’s classes got a taste of what’s to come as the district installed new furniture in her room. When asked about what she likes about the new furniture, Mrs. Sandtveit said “As a math teacher, I love that the desks have dry-erase boards for tops. I love the idea of the backpack hooks even if not all students use them. The higher desks in the back are nice so students can sit higher if they want and having everything on wheels is really nice.” Many of her students, such as freshmen Tanner Gibson and Ian Richards, enjoy the new furniture as well, considering it a decent upgrade over the current furniture. Richards said, “The new chairs are super comfortable. The old ones feel like you are sitting on a park bench.” Gibson said “I like the whiteboard tops and the tables that are higher up. The circle chairs that let you spin around are also cool.”
Moving on to the east side of the building, Berkley’s performing arts program will benefit from two major upgrades, starting with the new “black-box” theater (a small performance space set up to be used in a variety of configurations) addition that will be built at the end of the band hall to serve as a new choir room, which is a nice upgrade over their current classroom in the basement, and will serve as a multi-purpose space when choir is not in session to alleviate usage on the auditorium. The auditorium will also undergo a complete facelift, with new seats & finishes, a better sound system, a new control booth, improved backstage areas, better lighting, doubling the size of the lobby to add restrooms and a ticket booth, as well as being rebranded as the “Performing Arts Center.” When asked about the new theater, senior and choir student Alana Pickering said “Even though it won’t be built by the time I graduate, I’m excited about how better the new choir room will be for future students. It definitely beats singing in a basement!”
However, the crown jewel of the upgrades will no doubt be the brand new Berkley High Athletic and Robotics Center, which will be built on the trash lot across Catalpa from the BHS campus where the current robotics and maintenance buildings currently stand. This new 66,000 square foot fieldhouse will mainly contain an indoor 75-yard football/soccer field for sports practices and P.E. classes. The field will also be used for other school groups such as the marching band. The building will also contain new rooms for the robotics program, replacing the cramped and undersized building they currently utilize. Outside the building, the grounds will have two new athletic fields and an expanded student parking lot as well, much to the delight of student drivers.
In addition to the renovations listed above, the district is planning to update the finishes of the gyms and media centers in all buildings (except BHS), replace all the staff computers and projectors with new touchscreen digital displays, updating the BHS pool, renovate the BHS science wing, as well as build new cafeterias at Angell, Burton, Pattengill and Rogers elementary schools. Construction on the bond projects will begin in spring 2024 and will be complete by the end of 2026, and updates will be posted to the district website as well as on their social media pages.
