With Imagine Project 2 well underway on the southeast corner of the Oak Park and River Forest High School campus, the District 200 board of education received a virtual walk through of the component pieces of Project 3 at its meeting June 12.
Thursday’s presentation by Alyson Sternquist, senior associate at FGMArchitects, reflected results of the programming phase of Project 3, which is the research and decision-making process that ultimately determines a project’s scope. It’s the next step in development of research and a long-term master plan that started in 2017-18.
In other words, the programming phase presents the virtual “puzzle pieces” of the project. The next step is conceptual design, where FGMA will return in September with assembly of those pieces into a workable project.
The board unanimously approved advancing Project 3 to the conceptual design phase at a cost of $182,500.
While there was no discussion of the possible cost of this phase of rebuilding or how to finance it, Josh Gertz, a recently elected school board member, alluded to a potential tax increase referendum as early as April 2027.
“It’s basically space planning now,” Sternquist said after her presentation and after being peppered with board questions. “[It’s] making sure what is the footprint, what does it look like, where are the corridors? It’s at a conceptual level, so it doesn’t have mechanicals and structural and that.
“It’s basically taking the building blocks and starting to put them together, and knowing what some of our constraints are, and trying to figure out where we go down, where we go out.”
According to the district’s Imagine planning documentation, Project 3 would replace 70- to 100-year-old facilities at the southwest end of campus with new construction that will expand that area. That would include performing arts and physical education spaces and a green roof to manage stormwater runoff, designed to incorporate a future solar array.
The current facility is deemed to be outdated and too small for the number of students in various programs, especially the performing arts, with no Americans with Disabilities Act accessibility.
For example, the band program has grown significantly, with 125 students in marching band, up significantly from the military-style bands from decades ago. Thus, crowding is a safety issue, and is likely to get worse, with 180 students enrolled in sixth-grade-level band, Sternquist said. The square footage is 2,180 now; the recommended space is 3,750 square feet.
The orchestra and digital music rooms are retrofitted classrooms, while the chorus and ensemble rooms feature poor acoustics. What’s more, storage space is necessary for instruments, which are often placed on the floor, another potential hazard.
Music recommendations also include practice and ensemble rooms and teacher offices.
The theatre spaces feature many of the same problems. For example, the Studio 200 Black Box Theatre is a double-sized classroom and was never intended as a theatre space, Sternquist said, adding “they deserve a space designed for them.” Other issues are no back of house, bathroom or dressing room, and a nonstandard control booth.
Recommendations include increasing audience capacity 50%, doubling ceiling height, providing dressing rooms with bathrooms, and adding an elevated, accessible control room.
Other areas, like a costume room, were not part of the original 2017-18 master plan. Teacher offices and a stagecraft area were also recommended.
In the physical education areas, the trainer’s space is “woefully undersized” and inaccessible; the recommendation is to rectify those issues. Likewise, the wrestling room has inadequate temperature and humidity control. It also cannot be used for Phys ed classes. The recommendation is to provide an appropriately sized, accessible, multi-purpose space that can accommodate wrestling.
Locker rooms haven’t been updated for over 60 years, with inadequately sized – and rusty – lockers and poor air quality. Recommended are new appropriately sized locker rooms for wrestling, track and field and cross country, which is the largest extracurricular program in the district.
Other recommendations include gyms for the popular Adventure Ed class, and a cardio studio.
As part of the programming phase, Sternquist said students and faculty were surveyed and participated in focus groups. Tours were also conducted, including with performing arts department faculty.
Gertz said he and his board cohort went on tours with district administration, department heads and Imagine Foundation personnel to see the issues firsthand.
“We’ve been told our facilities are insufficient for the fine arts,” Gertz said. “I’ve kind of viewed this whole process, we need to regain public trust and be very transparent, making compromises. We need to make sure we’re showing people we’re cost conscious and regain their support in the hopes of the referendum passing.”
He added a referendum for Project 3 could occur in April 2027.
“Each of the board members had some tours of the spaces over the last six to eight weeks to see what the actual spaces look like, and seeing what the space was, was very enlightening,” board member Fred Arkin said Monday. “The band room was made for 45 to 55 kids and now they’ve got well over 100 in there.”
Board president Audrey Williams-Lee was on the original Imagine master plan team and was part of the group that worked on the performing arts spaces.
“For me, it was a really a validation,” she said of the recommendations. “Our school does a phenomenal job in performing arts and it shows we have a lot of work to do and it also shows our existing faculty is doing an excellent job.”
Sternquist also said that the programming recommendations are “not gospel.”
“This is vetting the information in a realistic ideal. We have not cut out anything yet,” she said, but in the same breath, she pointed out that, “reality will impose itself along the way. We haven’t started putting the puzzle pieces together.”
Also at OPRF
Board accepts $1 million Imagine donation: The board also accepted a $1 million donation from the Imagine Foundation to reimburse costs related to Project 2. It was the third such donation, according to Heidi Ruehle, the foundation’s executive director.
“Our process is we accumulate donations, around $1 million at a time, and we turn that over to D200,” Ruehle said.
The donation was separate from the recently announced $3.5 million state grant for an energy-efficient geothermal heating and cooling system for the new addition at the corners of Scoville Avenue and Lake Street.
Board approves new assistant superintendent: The board also unanimously approved Dr. Jennifer Hester as assistant superintendent for student learning, beginning July 1. Hester most recently served as the director of curriculum, instruction, and professional development at Homewood-Flossmoor Community High School District 233.