ZIKA & WEST NILE PROMPT HP OFFICIALS TO BE ON HIGH ALERT
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APRIL 2016 I Vol. 36, No. 4 parkcitiespeople.com @pcpeople
Critics Force Architects to Rework Exteriors HPISD'S FIRST NEW SCHOOL IN 70 YEARS TO SET THE STANDARD
COMMUNITY Student artist pens award-nominated cover for author 42
By Elizabeth Ygartua People Newspapers
The Highland Park ISD’s architecture firm Stantec is nearing a final design for the district’s fifth elementary school. With the district facing rising enrollment projections, voters approved last fall's bond package to reconstruct three of the four existing elementary schools and add the fifth. Students from Bradfield, Hyer, and University Park will sequentially use the new school while those campuses are being rebuilt. “We’re creating a new standard for the other schools,” said Jonathan Aldis, the lead architect. “To me it’s the realization of a lot of work and community feedback.” Response to renderings of the main entrance released in February forced designers back to the drawing board to make sure it feels as grand as the entrances to UP and Bradfield. The result: the addition of an outdoor space to the library on the second story above the entryway. "It starts to get this feeling of this unique identity. We keep hearing, 'All of our schools have a unique identity, what's number five going to be?' I think the outside courtyard and the elements like this start to do it," Aldis said at the to Aldis March 15 Board of Trustees meeting.
CAMPS
S TA N T E C A R C H I T E C T S
The school will be located on 4.3 acres on the west side of Northway Christian Church, if the sale of the property is completed this May. The district plans hopes to open the school in August 2017. Balfour Beatty will be the construction manager at risk. The school will likely be segmented into three zones, Aldis said at the Feb. 9 school board meeting. Classrooms will sit at the south end; the administration offices and library will be in the center; and general use spaces (gym, art rooms, underground parking garage, and cafeteria) will sit at the north end. To accommodate the slope of
LIVING WELL
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THREE THINGS Key features of the new school include the grand entrance, the centrally located library, and interactive learning spaces, such as the garden.
the property, which inclines about 19 feet from north to south, the zones will be broken into different stories — three on the south end and two on the north — connected on the ground level by sloped hall-
BUSINESS
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ways. This will address previous issues regarding students with physical disabilities, he said. “That’s been a big issue with a lot of the community about having students feel like they’re singled out,” Aldis said. “And when you design a new building, there’s no need for that.” The board has brought in an outside architect to review Stantec's plans as a courtesy to the district, according to Facilities Committee chair Jim Hitzelberger. He said the architect said the layout was "genius."
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COMMUNITY
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