Work in Progress

A Work In Progress

Maddie Woods

Staff Writer

Although some things haven’t changed at Lindbergh, others are changing before people’s eyes. At Lindbergh High School, construction has become a new normal for staff and students for more than a year now with no end in sight just yet. “Technically speaking, the field started in January of 2020. So that was the first real thing we did was Flyers Field. But if you’re talking about building construction, they started tearing down “stuff” in May of 2020. Theoretically it should be done by August of ‘23, so after next school year,” said Dr. Eric Cochran, the high school’s main principal.

Photo of a portion of the new building. Photo taken by Lindbergh Schools.

Although this whole project won’t be completed for a while, there are some things that are currently done and are available for staff and students now. For instance, the football field is now a turf field and is being used for football games and practices, including some field hockey games, and other events, like pep rallies for school, have been held on the field. The commons also has been updated as well as the main gym: Gym 3. The question on most people’s minds is why so much money is being spent on a new school? “The big reason for the one building is primarily safety, with the old campus prior to it’s partial demolition, there were 60 doors that could be opened at any given time and unlocked on our campus. That was the only way for students to get to different classes that they would have was to keep all of those doors unlocked at any time. Which meant that anyone could theoretically walk onto our campus, walk into a door and nobody would be able to stop them and so with an inclosed, single building campus, we can shut down all doors and have one point of entry per person when the day starts and that will allow us to put our security there, a check-in point there, and they’ll come in through that location,” explained Dr. Cochran. People familiar with Lindbergh see a common occurrence outside of each classroom. Every once in a while students and/or teachers will be heard complaining that their classroom space is too small or is too crowded for students to comfortably work on the task at hand. This is a concern that’s also being felt by the administration. “I say all the time that when you walk down our hallways, you can see why we need a new building because every classroom has 3 or 4 kids sitting outside of the room working on the floor. That might still happen, but we’re going to have spaces that’re designed for that purpose, where kids can actually sit on a couch outside a room and collaborate or in a small group room. There’s a lot of cool spaces like that in the new building,” explained Dr. Cochran. Also with construction, not everything was necessarily about

safety.

“The last major reason is because all of the infrastructural pieces that feed this building, heat, air conditioning, electricity, they were all reaching the end of their natural lifecycle and they were all going to have to be replaced and it was much cheaper in a new building then to actually do that in an old building,” explained Dr. Cochran.” One of the first major construction events was the tearing down of the Math building. The Math building housed most, if not all, of the Math classes as well as the teachers. Since then, teachers in all subjects have been shuffled around to the other two buildings to accommodate for space. Unfortunately, that meant that not everybody was going to be fortunate enough to have their own classroom space. Some teachers have become Traveling Teachers meaning they travel from classroom to classroom. Some use a cart to get around that holds all of the materials needed for their classes. The Traveling Teachers use other teachers’ classrooms for a class and then possibly move to another classroom to do it all over again. Also, because the new building won’t be done until the 2023-2024 school year, those Traveling Teachers will continue to travel next year as well.

Drone shot of the construction site. Photo taken by Lindbergh Schools

7

Profile 02.25.22

A Work In Progress

Maddie Woods Staff Writer

“This year being a Traveling Teacher has been hard because when you have your own classroom, all of the materials you need are right there so not having my own room, I have to move everything with me and that increases my chances of forgetting something. Also since I travel it’s hard for kids to find me. For instance, I’ve had kids tell me that they walked around trying to find me for 15 minutes and that’s hard because they come to me for help or to make up a test and by the time they get to me they only have a few minutes of my time before I have to pack my stuff up and move. Although it can be frustrating at times, I’m grateful that my students are patient with me and I’m patient with them. With that being said, I’m looking forward to having my own space in the new building not just for myself but also for my students,” elaborated Amy Kaiser, a math teacher at Lindbergh and the math department chair. “We’ll still have about the same amount of Traveling Teachers as we do this year, next year, still. So those individuals will probably have another year of traveling before they have their own space, again,” explained Lindsey Perkins, the Senior principal. Although it may seem stressful for the teachers and administrators, there are some exciting things that students will be able to see and be a part of in the near future. “Spring break we’re vacating most of the counseling office. All of the counselors will be moving to different locations; they’ll be working out of grade- level office for the rest of the school year. Also this summer, in June, we’re emptying out everything in the main building and moving everything into the new building. School will be in the new building next year and the main building will be under construction next year,” explained Dr. Cochran. Dr. Cochran is especially excited about the building’s future day to day use. “What I’m really looking forward to the most is watching our teachers and students interact with this new space on a daily basis. Just how they’re going to interact with the new classrooms that they’re going to be in, how they are going to interact with and live in the collaboration spaces since we don’t have those in the building currently,” he said. A collage of photos of construction at the high school. Photos taken by Lindbergh Schools.

Members of the freshmen class will be able to be in the building the longest of the current grade levels. Freshman Noah Reinbold expressed his excitement for the new building. “I’m excited to see how the new school looks and how we’ll get from class-to-class. I’m excited to see all of the new things that aren’t in the building now and see how it works I’m glad that I’m a freshman and not an upperclassmen because I’m new to the high school now so I’m not really familiar with this building where as upperclassmen have been used to this building for at least two years now so I think it’s easier for the freshman to get used to a completely new building again” explains Reinbold, a freshman at Lindbergh. Although the Construction is a work in progress and will be for the next foreseeable future, the finished product is sure to be worth

8

Profile 02.25.22