By Tara Cavanaugh
Burns Park Elementary looks like an idyllic old fashioned school from the early 20th century. The brick building boasts huge paned windows, crown moldings and alcoves. Surrounding oak trees only add to the charm.
But this pretty little picture turns nightmarish for a technology expert who wants to update the school to 21st century technology. Why is that? Burns Park, like most schools in the district, is more than 50 years old. Schools that old need renovations before they can support any upgrades.
What kinds of renovations do they need? Mechanical, electrical and environmental renovations, says Randy Trent, executive director of physical properties for the Ann Arbor Public Schools.
The rooms that hold the internet servers should be clean, cool and dry. At the moment, many servers are stashed away in custodian’s closets–sometimes even near a water source and most often without air conditioning.
“Server equipment really needs air conditioning and ventilation for proper operation and longer life,” Trent says, adding that any server equipment that is currently near water will be moved to new rooms.
“The more heat you put on a system like that, the more prone to failure they are,” says John VanRiper, the district’s director of information technology.
Running cables in these buildings is also difficult. Old walls can be two to five times thicker than modern walls, and they’re often made of concrete block and/or drywall.
“The original design never took into consideration the fact that you want to run wires, so that presents a lot of the challenges,” Trent says. Old schools will often need “raceways,” which are thick pipes that run along walls and hold cables, and drop ceilings, which conceal wiring with a layer of ceiling tiles placed lower than the actual ceiling.
The beautiful old schools present quite the mystery, Trent adds.
“The actual blueprints, the information that you work from, are not as clear,” he says. Some old prints are literally blue with light etchings. “Modern (building blueprints are) black and white and some of it’s 3-dimensional, so you can see much more of what you’re getting into. For the older buildings, the actual drawings are not as sophisticated.”
Sometimes a school’s design presents unique challenges too. Trent points out Huron High School’s curved walls make drilling less predictable. “Whenever there’s doubt, that’s risk,” he says, “and wherever there’s risk, that’s more money.”
Trent is quick to note that before any of the renovations take place, the district will first take care of environmental issues such as asbestos and lead paint in the affected areas. The district has already identified the areas with those issues. If the Tech Bond is approved next month, renovations would begin in summer 2013, when students are not in the buildings.
Trent also notes the district must follow all legal standards for removing asbestos and also must test afterwards to prove it is gone. The district also takes similar precautions with lead paint.
If the Tech Bond is approved, the district would spend $4.11 million on cabling, asbestos and lead removal, and mechanical and electrical renovations.
Related stories
- Local tech experts endorse the Technology Bond
- Why is Skyline included in the Tech Bond?
- INFOGRAPHIC: The Tech Bond by the numbers
- INFOGRAPHIC: AAPS Educators talk technology
- All district computers now out of warranty
- District hopes to expand wireless access
- Old computers lead to workarounds, wait time during reading intervention
- Spanish students use web, tech resources to work on speaking skills
- Elementary teacher upgrades writing lessons
5 Trackbacks / Pingbacks