BY BRAD DEVEREAUX
After years of planning, re-planning, drawing, waiting and hoping, the plans will finally become a reality when the golden shovel hits the sand Monday at the site of the future 6-12 facility in Cowley.
Next week’s groundbreaking ceremony will hold a symbolic value that work is beginning, and subcontractors will get started on their actual work immediately, Superintendent of Schools Shon Hocker told the Chronicle Monday.
Sub-contractor bids will be received today (Thursday) from 3 to 5 p.m. at the Rocky Mountain Elementary School. 207 bid requests were recorded in Cheyenne in late October, a record number, Hocker said.
“That all translates down into hopefully some cheaper bids and some very good opportunities for maybe coming in a little under budget,” Hocker said. About $23.5 million is currently budgeted for the project, which includes a $1-million auxiliary gym that is being paid for by the district.
Once bids have been received, construction manager at risk Groathouse Construction will review each bid and make sure each is for the requested items. Groathouse will then award the bids, starting with work that needs to be done right away, such as dirt and foundation work, Hocker said, and then construction will be under way.
“I’m expecting (Groathouse) will begin to award the bids within a few days,” Hocker said. “Then it’s just a matter of time; how long it takes that subcontractor to mobilize, get set up and start building.”
He said he expects to see work starting right around Thanksgiving.
The school
“The building is a very well designed, state-of-the-art building,” Hocker said. “We’re very excited about it. We’ve incorporated numerous new features from various buildings around the country into this design.”
Some of the notable features of the new facility include a centrally located “cafetorium” that triples as a cafeteria, commons area and auditorium seating. The school has two separate wings for the high school and middle school, each with its own student area – an expansion in the hall between a group of classrooms.
“The middle school students will have their own little place to hang out so they don’t feel like they have to specifically mingle with the high school kids,” Hocker said, and the same for the high-schoolers. “You could have a team project going on (between the math and science rooms), utilizing both curriculums.”
Each of the 20 classrooms (plus a few other rooms) will feature a learning wall, with a smart board, sliding marker boards and storage cabinets.
The media center (library) will be connected to the computer lab.
A large partially covered back patio will be set up with tables and chairs for students and teachers to use.
The band/choir room with two practice rooms will be across from the main office and right behind the stage. A removable wall will divide the stage and band room so pianos and other equipment can be wheeled onto the stage easily, Hocker said.
The district has spent a lot of time designing a functional vocational wing of the school, he said, which will include a family and consumer science classroom, welding classroom, CAD room, art room and a large building trades room. There will be two large bays at the end of the wing for loading and unloading large pieces of equipment.
The main gym will be roughly 11,000 square-feet with a set of bleachers on both sides. It will hold approximately 800 people, Facilities Director Michael Simmons said.
A second, 7,000 square-foot auxiliary gym is being built outside of current School Facility Comission funding guidelines. The auxiliary gym is being paid for with just under $1 million in school reserve funds.
“To come back in a year or two and build that auxiliary gym, you’re probably talking several million dollars,” Hocker said. “There’s a huge cost-saving factor of doing it at the time of this project.”
He explained that two walls of the structure would have to be built even if the second gym wasn’t included, which means building it now saves the district money.
“Our board definitely recognizes that we cannot run middle school and high school activities in one gym. There’s not one school in the entire state of Wyoming that has been asked to do that,” Hocker said. “The board did what’s best for kids and they stepped up and used our reserve account to fund the gym. I applaud them for that. In my opinion it’s a very good use for that money. It’s unfortunate that the SFC doesn’t see the importance of that.”
A weight room, which may be opened to the public, Hocker said, will sit adjacent to both gyms and the locker rooms. A 1,283-square-foot wrestling room will be on the other side of both gyms.
The boys and girls locker rooms will have roll-up metal doors that, when closed, will divide each locker room into two separate rooms. The doors can be left open to provide larger rooms. Hocker said this feature would be useful when teams visit for sports tournaments. The boys and girls locker rooms will be separated by a permanent wall.
He said the design team worked to maximize shower capacity, as well as to create individual shower stalls to give students more privacy.
Groundbreaking
Monday will be the groundbreaking, starting at 1 p.m. at the site of the new facility, next to the new baseball field in Cowley on Hwy. 310. The half-hour ceremony will include a golden-shovel groundbreaking with district employees and others who have a part of the project, Hocker said.
Rocky Mountain Middle and High School students will be bussed over for the ceremony and fourth- and fifth-grade elementary students will walk over, weather permitting.
“They’re very excited about the prospect of a new school,” Hocker said.
“This has been a long-time coming and it’s finally here,” he said. “It’s been a process our school board has worked on for a long time. Many other projects within the state have come on discussion after ours and have finished by now.
“We’re very excited we’re moving forward and to vacate our other buildings. After one more school year in our current facilities, we’ll be able to move into this new facility and provide a very appropriate, very nice education for our kids.”
“It will be a very good addition to this valley and be very good for Big Horn One.”
The school is slated to be completed in the summer of 2010 and open Aug. 1. The district plans for the facility to be ready for school in mid-August. Once the facility is completed Hocker said the district would be “very well off,” as far as facilities go.
“Burlington has fabulous facilities, Rocky Elementary is brand new, and now we’ll have a new middle school / high school,” he said.
He said the district is also looking into fixing other problems caused by this project, such as building new administrative offices, which will need to house special education and transportation departments. He said the district would continue to work with the state in completing a few other projects, such as tracks at the new facility and at Burlington.
“Once we get that all accomplished, I think from a facilities standpoint, this district will be top notch,” Hocker said.
He said the district is very thankful of the support of the community throughout the project.
Other district
happenings
An open house will be held at Rocky Mountain Elementary School today (Thursday) from 7 to 7:30 p.m. to honor outgoing board members Bryan Lee and Russ Boardman. There will be a half-hour executive session following the open house, and then the regular monthly board meeting will be held, starting at 8 p.m.