By Tim Lucas
(December 30, 2023) — As many of you know, our school district is in the midst of planning significant infrastructure maintenance and improvements to the school buildings and campuses. The purpose is to bring our school facilities up to current safety and accessibility standards and to prepare them for our students into the future. School leadership and the Board of Education (I’ll refer to them as the “District” in this article) is referring to this initiative as the Regional School District 17 Master Plan.
In my opinion, the District has made admirable efforts to communicate the progress to date. Four “Community Conversations” have occurred in 2023. Each of these discussions has been open to the public and was also simulcast on our community TV station HKTV. If you were unable to attend, links to the presentations and recordings of each of the meetings can be found on the Master Plan website. The District also hosted tours at each of the four school campuses so the public could observe the condition of each of the buildings.
Significant professional consultant time and effort has been invested to prepare the Master Plan. An assessment of the current facilities was performed and a report was generated. This report is publicly available at the Master Plan website. Similarly, a study of the population and enrollment forecasts through 2033 is available there as well. The school population is forecasted to increase moderately in the next 10 years. A 2.1% increase (39 students) through 2027 and a 7.6% increase (141 students) from 2028-2033.
The average age of the buildings on our four school campuses is 52 years. Many of the buildings have additions, but the year the main building was constructed at each school is as follows: Killingworth Elementary School, 1948 (75 years); Burr Elementary School, 1973 (50 years); HK Intermediate & Middle School, 2007 (16 years); HK High School, 1954 (69 years). Several of the buildings have characteristics that do not meet current safety and accessibility codes. The District has also indicated that some of the buildings and their systems are deteriorating faster than they can be maintained.
The consultants hired by the District have presented numerous possibilities for the school buildings and campuses. The options have ranged from renovating the buildings on the four existing campuses to closing three of the buildings and consolidating all of the schools onto one campus. Although consolidation of all of the schools to one campus seems like an unlikely outcome, closing a school or schools and consolidating the student population to two or three campuses definitely seems to be the likely recommendation.
The capital required to fund this Master Plan will be significant, regardless which outcome is selected. The estimate from the consultants well exceeds $100M (just the estimate to repair the existing facilities over the next 10 years was $119.5M) and may ultimately exceed $200M. The consultants are working to develop a phased approach to help the communities fund these projects in a responsible way.
Our schools are an important part of our community. During one of the presentations the architect indicated that students spend 90% of their time indoors and that the physical environment impacts student learning progress by 25%. Investment in our schools is critical.
The District has solicited feedback from the communities through two surveys so far. The results of the first survey indicated that 81% of the respondents saw the need for renovation or replacement of at least one of the schools and the greatest need is at the high school, closely followed by both elementary schools. (The results of the second survey have not been published yet).
I have attended each of the four Community Conversations and I participated in a tour at each of the four schools. My opinion is that attendance at each event was sparse. I’m writing this article to hopefully promote interest and engagement in this Master Plan project. Although I certainly have my opinion on the current status of the school buildings and my desire for the school buildings for our future students, I am in no way advocating for any proposal here. I simply hope to inform the communities of what is being discussed and illustrate the magnitude of the decisions we are going to be asked to make.
The next steps will be for the District to present their proposed option or options for the school projects to the community. I encourage everyone to attend that meeting. There will then be a referendum where the towns will get to vote for or against the proposal. The team has indicated that these next steps should happen in early 2024. The stated goal is to apply for the first state grant to fund the first phase of the project by June 30, 2024.
The Master Plan website can be found at https://sites.google.com/rsd17.org/masterplanproject?fbclid=IwAR3EkJwo2gXo7tpugvyUdN9qWB7VFWdLO0d26UkbhJgG84Cd36ySKQ4bBSk
Tim Lucas is a Higganum resident who was asked by HK-Now and Haddam Killingworth News to share his insights into the RSD 17 Master Plan based on his participation in the District’s meetings and building tours. His opinions do not necessarily reflect those of this newspaper.
