Plans for Sartell schools come into focus

by Dennis Dalman

editor@thenewsleaders.com

An estimated 50 percent of the students in schools today will be working someday in the kinds of jobs nobody has anticipated yet.

That’s how fast the world and technology is changing, said Sartell-St. Stephen School District Superintendent Jeff Schwiebert, who admitted the prospect is “a bit spooky because we just don’t know.”

However, the prospect is a lot less spooky when schools prepare now for an unknown future, and that is what the Sartell-St. Stephen School District intends to do largely via its building-facilities plan and innovative programming.

At two recent Wednesday public meetings (Nov. 30 and Dec. 7) at Sartell High School, Schwiebert presented updates on the building plans that voters authorized last May to the tune of $105.8 million. About $90 million of that amount will pay for the new high school to be built on land next to Oak Ridge Elementary School. The rest of the money will be used to upgrade existing schools for new grade configurations.

The following story is based on the first of those public meetings, the Nov. 30 one at which Schwiebert was the main speaker and Sartell High School Principal Brenda Steve gave the audience a visual “walk-through” of the new high school with the help of architectural-artist conceptions.

The title of both meetings was “Building Excellence Facilities Plan: Planning for the Next Generation of Learners.”

Schools can no longer be locked into one way of doing things because of unknown jobs in the future, Schwiebert noted. That is why the new high school in Sartell has been designed for maximum flexibility of uses in both space and programming. The new design accommodates a lot of hands-on group learning, teamwork projects and lots of gathering space for students, teachers and visitors from the world at large, including the business world.

In the new learning methods, there will be lots of partnerships formed, including public and private ones, all working together with all students educated well to benefit one and all, and society at large, Schwiebert said. No longer will education consist of boxed-in classrooms remote from the local world and the world beyond, as they were so many years ago, when rote learning and memorization were the main learning tools.

The new learning methods will be interactive, with lots of teamwork, group problem-solving and learning/teaching partners from all sectors of the local area. The physical layout of the new high school will reflect the new learning.

For example, there are long wings of buildings (called Learning Neighborhoods) that connect to a huge commons area, designed with maximum visibility as a place where people can gather and learn. The commons area will be twice the size of the one in the current high school, Schwiebert noted. There will also be all kinds of specialty areas for specialty learning.

New high school

Ground will be broken for the new high school in the next summer, and it’s expected to open for grades 9-12 in the fall of 2019.

Schwiebert said soil tests at the site have shown the soil is fine to build upon and will not need major infilling to make it suitable. Planners, he said, had worried about that a bit until they received the good news.

Between fall of 2019 and spring of 2020, the current high school will be remodeled and repurposed for grades 6-8 (middle school). It will open in the fall of 2020. The current middle school will become an intermediate school for grades 3-5, and that will open at the same time. Improvements will also be done for Pine Meadow Elementary and Oak Ridge Elementary for grades K-2. The District Center will house the early-childhood programs.

One important feature of all the schools will be a new strategy for security, Schwiebert noted. For example, the entryways will lead directly to the main school office, and a door by the lobby with access to the rest of the school will stay locked. Those who work in the office will have a constant surveillance capacity via eyesight and cameras of the areas surrounding the schools, with clear sight lines from the office windows to the parking-lot areas. If staff sees anything amiss, the school can be put on alert and locked down immediately.

Visibility is a major factor in security, Schwiebert noted. Teachers, staff, students – all involved in the schools – must have visibility so they can see what’s around them. That is why the interior of the new high school will have a very open design, both for security and for social gatherings.

Features

The architects for the new 290,000 square-foot, two-story high school are David Leapaldt of iiw Minnesota of St. Cloud; and Judy Hoskins and Scott Krenner, both of Cunningham Group Architects of Minneapolis.

Superintendent Schwiebert and Principal Steve noted the features of the new school.

There will be three long wings, each containing multiple “learning neighborhoods,” and the wings will all connect to a large commons area.

A performing-arts center will accommodate seating for 800, which is 300 more than the current high-school theater. In addition, there will be rooms for band, orchestra and choir, and spaces for art classes and projects.

There will be no traditional library (media center), although there will be collections of books in various places throughout the school.

It’s hoped there will be a student-run coffee shop, along with a school-supplies store.

A culinary-arts program will be able to use the large kitchen-serving area of the lunchroom.

There will be many specialized areas for vocational-style, hands-on learning classes, such as welding, carpentry, automotive and many other learning pursuits. Another specialized learning area will be a bio-med place so students can learn aspects of that pursuit through a partnership with St. Cloud Orthopedics.

The school areas have all been designed to accommodate students with special needs.

Inside there will be three gyms and a pool, as well as spaces for weight-training, a mat room for wrestling and other activities, and a general physical-fitness area.

In addition to the indoor gyms and pool, the athletic facilities will include two baseball fields, three softball fields, a football field, four soccer fields, a lacrosse field and tennis courts.

Traffic

A bike-and-walking trail is expected to be installed on the west side of Pinecone Road leading from the heart of Sartell to the new school. Currently, there is a trail on much of the east side, but planners want to be sure walkers-bikers will not have to cross busy Pinecone Road to get to the route to school.

Currently, the city and school district are working out a safety plan to design traffic functions at the new-school site. It will have three intersections, and so planners are deeply concerned about safety factors.

Schwiebert said at least one option is a roundabout on Pinecone Road. He said he is aware some people do not care for roundabouts, but he personally favors that option because roundabouts force vehicles to slow down, and that is just what’s needed, he added, at a very busy school site next to Pinecone Road.

For more about the facilities plan, go to the Sartell-St. Stephen School District website. Then, on the top blue bar, pull down the menu under “About Us.” Click on “Building Excellence Facilities Plan.” Then scroll down to find what you want to find.

For a three-dimensional fly-through vision of the new high school, click on “High School Flythrough Video Draft.” To see a video of the public meeting hosted by Schwiebert, click on “Video of Nov. 30 Community Presentation.” And to see Powerpoint highlights of the plans for all schools, click on “Community Form Powerpoint Presentation.”