While the students are off this summer, construction crews will be working at more than half of Elgin School District U46’s 53 schools.
Some of the work already has begun, but most of the $14.5 million worth of remodeling and repairs will be done during the two and a half months that the classrooms stand empty.
One of the most expensive projects is coming at Abbott Middle School on Elgin’s southwest side. This red brick building was expanded in the 1990s but its main section was built in 1931 as a “junior high school” to relieve crowding at Elgin High School and some elementary schools by absorbing the students in grades 6 through 9 (later changed to 7 through 9) from some parts of the City of Elgin. This “junior high school” was a controversial idea in its day, and no other junior high was built in District U46 for another 19 years. In 1982 the district switched to a “middle school” system, with just seventh- and eighth-graders in middle school, and the ninth-graders from Abbott and other junior highs were moved back into the high schools.
This summer the district will spend an estimated $1.1 million tuckpointing Abbott’s cracked and loose bricks, which Plant Operations Director Christopher Allen said have been letting water into the walls. The contractor also will totally replace the crumbling brick in the top two feet of each wall.
“This is just a lovey old building,” then-board member Jennifer Shroder commented earlier this spring when the U46 Board of Education approved a contract to do the brick work.
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Shroder said she feared that 84-year-old building’s appearance could be marred by the brick work. But Allen said that “nobody will know the difference” after the bricks are replaced. He said the Abbott walls have received repairs to specific trouble spots through the years but never a full rehab like the one planned now.
Meanwhile, Abbott’s west side Elgin companion, Kimball Middle School, will receive a new roof costing $845,000.
Some even more expensive, though less visible, projects involve heating and cooling systems. Willard Elementary School in South Elgin will get new boilers, a new chiller and unit ventilators at a cost of $1.8 million. Sunnydale Elementary in Streamwood is due for a new boiler and unit ventilators for $1.3 million. And Horizon Elementary in Hanover Park will get $1.1 million for a new boiler and chiller.
The district also will spend $770,000 for a new backup boiler at Bartlett High School.
More than half the 53 schools (33) will get improved electronic door-access controls and surveillance systems at a total cost of $1.2 million. The security system in the north wing of the Educational Services Center (also known as “the administration building” or “the old Elgin High”) in downtown Elgin also will get a new security system for $500,000. District CEO Tony Sanders said that when the building’s doors are unlocked at night for public meetings and special events, someone can wander anywhere in the building now.
Elgin High School will get improvements to its culinary-arts kitchen, priced at about $660,000.
Parking-lot paving or expansions are in store for the southwest lot at Larkin High School in Elgin ($400,000); for Eastview Middle School in Bartlett ($415,000); for the district’s plant operations and warehousing department on Elgin’s far east side ($672,000), where the parking lot will be expanded; and the school bus base along Shales Parkway, where paving plus new gasoline pumps will total $900,000.
An emergency shelter is being built at a cost of $560,000 inside the plant operations building. This is a weak steel-frame structure that District U46 administrators fear could collapse if hit by a tornado or a stiff wind storm. The new shelter is designed to protect both the people who work there and some key communications and control equipment whose loss could virtually paralyze the school district, Chief Operating Officer Jeff King told the school board.
New windows are coming for Harriet Gifford Elementary in Elgin ($295,000) and Clinton Elementary in South Elgin ($300,000).
At Streamwood High, $30,000 will be spent to design a future remodeling of its tennis courts while $290,000 will go to replace some ventilating gear.
At Coleman Elementary in Elgin, $400,000 will be spent to repair a problem with drainage and moisture infiltration. At Heritage Elementary in Streamwood $95,000 will go to remodel restrooms that were built without complete walls between toilets and don’t meet current standards for accessibility by disabled people.
Liberty Elementary in Bartlett is in line for $250,000 in roof repairs while $540,00 will be spent to replace corroding water pipes at Eastview Middle.
The projects will be constructed by proceeds from District U46’s controversial bond issues approved earlier this year, so King said they would not be affected by possible cuts in state funding.