SE Dubois School Board Prepares for Facility Upgrades

Representatives from Gibraltar Design presented an overview of the district’s needs based on feedback received over the past few months. Ideas and options for review were discussed, focusing on priorities for Forest Park High School and Ferdinand Elementary, They presented a consensus on several items by reviewing responses from school board and administration. 

The highest priority at Ferdinand Elementary was identified as expanding the main office, while the secondary goal was updating student restrooms to be ADA accessible. Gibraltar said that their focus was on highlighting key items as priority consideration items and identifying strategic investments based on long-term return value. 

At Forest Park High School, the consensus results prioritized a desire to demo the cafeteria kitchen upper level classroom in the original building. In addition, there is a desire to add a new cafeteria kitchen addition and add new additional classrooms as well as adding more ADA accessibility. In particular, student restrooms need to be updated to be ADA compliant. There is also a need for some roof replacement. 
 

There was a consensus requesting to demo the junior high gym and locker room, and essentially the whole 1950s building. Gibraltar said that a new gym is needed, but more input is needed on what should replace it. There was also strong support for renovating the 1975 portion of the building. In both the high school and junior high, there is a need to focus on infrastructure elements that have outlived their lifespan like roof replacement, updating HVAC, mechanical units, temperature control throughout the building, and electrical systems. 

Gibraltar will continue to evaluate district-wide preventative maintenance for items approaching end of life and will present some estimates at the May 7 board meeting. The board said that they will have to take the findings under advisement to see which action items should be prioritized. They have narrowed down a lot of items that have come from the staff survey, the facilities study, and the Gibraltar evaluation. 

In other business, some staffing changes were approved as presented. The board heard that a $50,000 donation playground grant was received from Dubois County Community Foundation to Cedar Crest for playground equipment. Students voted on what playground equipment they would like to have. The baseball renovation project will also begin this summer. Several generous donations from the community have been received including one for $20,000 from Superb Tooling and $30,000 from Dubois County Community Foundation.