Officials show off new classrooms part of $147M bond approval

Karie Angell Luc | Pioneer Press | Aug 16, 2022

Aside from faculty, staff and students, there will be some other newness across Barrington School District 220 as the academic year sets to start, including kids at the middle schools being able to receive instruction in classrooms attached to the building and not in the separate trailers that had been used for more than a decade.

“They definitely served their purpose,” SD220 school board President Sandra Ficke-Bradford said about the trailers. “They did what they needed to do and the community recognized that having a permanent building would be more beneficial.”

On Monday, SD220 invited the public to attend ribbon cutting ceremonies at Barrington Middle School- Station and Prairie campuses, two of five schools that have recently undergone renovations. Tours of the new spaces followed.

Some 900 students attend the Station campus, in grade 6 to 8, with the enrollment ticking up, officials said. The trailers were falling apart and not able to keep up with enrollment demand.

The mobile classrooms – as they were officially called – accommodated world language classes. Students would exit the main school building to access the classrooms in the trailers. If the weather was bad, such as a tornado threat, students were quickly relocated inside the building away from the temporary trailers, officials explained.

Construction crews have been putting the final touches on new additions at Station and Prairie middle school campuses, as well as at Grove Avenue Elementary School, ahead of the first day of classes in the district Aug. 22.

Crews are also completing projects at Roslyn Road and Sunny Hill elementary schools, which include STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) spaces and sensory rooms at each school.

A new playground at Sunny Hill, slated to be completed in September, district officials said.

The district enrolls nearly 8,200 students across 12 schools, in grade pre-K to 12. Students live in surrounding towns that span parts of Cook, Lake, McHenry and Kane counties, including Barrington and all or portions of Barrington Hills, Carpentersville, Deer Park, Fox River Grove, Hoffman Estates, Inverness, Lake Barrington, North Barrington, Port Barrington, South Barrington and Tower Lakes.

On March 17, 2020, 60% of voters in Barrington School District 220 boundaries approved a $147 million bond referendum to fund capital projects.

At Station Monday, there was a plaque-reveal to help commemorate new classroom space and other updates. Officials used festive, oversized red scissors to cut a wide red ribbon, marking the occasion.

Visitors touring the school were greeted with a new entrance and office areas. They could see for themselves the new, approximately 18,500 square feet addition created over land that had accommodated the classroom trailers for about 15 years.

The addition alleviates having kids walk outside, Station Principal Jim Aalfs said.

“So that was a need we had and this (new classroom space) fulfills that and then some. Just the classrooms themselves … the way in which they’re designed, where it’s allowing us to be able to have multiple groups working together, like we never had before,” Aalfs said. “We’re really excited for that.”

Eight mobile classrooms were removed in June 2021 and scrapped – not reused or donated. The addition was then built for nine classrooms with flex space.

Large retractable walls on some new spaces can be rolled up, resembling large industrial-type garage doors with windows.

Aalfs said for the community to allow the district to do the renovations, “I think there’s a vision but there’s also a need that’s been addressed. And we’re very grateful.”

Craig Winkelman, district deputy superintendent, and former superintendent Brian Harris – who retired at the end of the 2020-2021 school year – attended the Monday tour.

“It’s going to provide dedicated learning space for our students, [it’s] climate controlled, it’s safe, it’s attached to the building versus our students having to go outside,” Winkelman said.

Harris remembers feeling concerned about student safety at Station Middle School when he was school chief. Robert Hunt is set to begin his second school year as SD220 superintendent when school starts Aug. 22.

“The referendum was a clear thing on target for safety and security,” Harris said.

He said the former trailers, with their flooring and roofing issues, “had no value.”

“We tried to sell them, nobody wanted them,” the former superintendent said.

Four years ago, Harris and colleagues “did the visioning” by visiting several states to see schools with renovated spaces for a firsthand look at possibilities.

Harris called the final result he experienced Monday “really cool.

“The board and the staff here, the architect and the construction people did a great job,” he said. “It’s just phenomenal.”