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Modernizing Berne-Knox-Westerlo
schools to meet current and future needs is a top priority this
year as the facilities committee considers a number of
possibilities - and price levels - for a new bond project the
Board of Education may present to district residents for
approval within the next six months.
Some improvements under
consideration include a complete renovation of the gym,
cafeteria and locker rooms at the Junior/Senior High School, the
addition of three new special education classrooms and the
installation of two elevators.
This project, the second
presented to BKW residents in four years, follows a long-range
plan to evaluate building improvements needed to improve
BKW’s
aging facilities.
Achieving full compliance
with the Americans with Disabilities Act in the Junior/Senior
High School is this project’s top priority, now that the
elementary school is fully up to date thanks to the 2002 capital
project.
Accessibility is so poor in
the Junior/Senior High that wheelchair-bound students must eat
lunch in a classroom, Schrade said. In addition, the boys’
locker room is completely inaccessible to students in
wheelchairs.
More special education
classrooms are also being considered for the Junior/ Senior High
to allow the district’s growing population of children with
special educational needs to attend class in their home school.
“We feel right now we can’t
meet the needs of the kids who must be taught out of district, “
said Kim LaBelle,
coordinator of BKW’s
special education program. “If we expanded we could bring
students of similar needs back, which would be great.”
Schrade said adding the
classrooms could help save money on bus fuel and reduce the need
for out-of-district special education services.
The longer the school waits
to update the Junior/Senior High, the more vulnerable it becomes
to potential legal action, Schrade said.
Schrade believes the district
can use state reimbursement guidelines to its advantage by
addressing all the school’s pressing needs at once.
That’s why the facilities
committee is considering various project options – to give
taxpayers the most return on any facilities investment by
securing the largest construction reimbursements from the state
at the lowest possible construction costs, Schrade said.
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