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Jonathan Alder construction zones hammer ahead
(by Kristy Zurbrick, Madison Editor - August 03, 2010)
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 Messenger photo by Kristy Zurbrick
Walls go up for the gymnasium at the site of the new Plain City Elementary.
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Two active construction sites mean big changes—some now, some later—for Jonathan Alder Local Schools students in kindergarten through sixth grade.
At the site of the new Plain City Elementary, a half-mile south of the village center on Chillicothe Street, walls are going up for the gymnasium. Administrative offices will sit in front of the gym. The classroom wing will sit to the south of the gym. The building will be complete and ready for students by the fall of 2011.
At Canaan Middle School, students won’t have to wait to see renovations. Some will be done by the time they return to school on Aug. 24; the rest will come together over the next 16 months. The construction schedule will not interrupt instruction.
First to be completed is a revamped cafeteria with new floors, a new ceiling, new finishes, new windows and a fresh coat of paint.
“We kept the frame and replaced virtually everything else,” said Superintendent Doug Carpenter. New equipment is going in the kitchen, too.
Near the cafeteria, construction crews are expanding existing rest rooms that will include two new locker rooms.
The next big deadline is May 2011, when a two-story classroom addition is scheduled to be finished. Then, the original three-story building, built in the early 1900s facing Route 42, will be torn down. A one-story library wing will be built in its place by November of next year.
Both the Canaan and the new Plain City Elementary site feature a first for Jonathan Alder Local Schools—geothermal heating and cooling systems.
“We incurred some additional expense to make sure we have energy efficient buildings. In the long term, we hope it will really save us some money,” Carpenter said.
The district also is making a shift to sloped metal roofs, not only for energy efficiency but also for durability. As opposed to rubber-based roofs tucked behind built-up walls, metal roofs that are set directly on exterior walls drain more easily and resist expansion and contraction issues, Carpenter said.
On the environmental side, project manager Chad Blind noted that 75 percent of construction waste at both sites will be recycled. He also said his crews plan to salvage old photos and other memorabilia from the original part of the building at the request of former students and community members.
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