Assabet Valley Celebrates $62.4 Million Renovation Project

Hundreds of alumni, families, students, staff, and local dignitaries witnessed history as Assabet Valley Regional Technical High officially cut the ribbon commemorating the completion of a $62.4 million renovation project, announced the school on Monday.

The project essentially began years ago, under the leadership of former Superintendent/Director Mary Jo Nawrocki, long before actual construction was visible.

Nawrocki and her Assistant Superintendent, Patrick Collins, wrote the Statement of Intent for the Massachusetts School Building Authority, (MSBA) and gained approval for a commitment from them for 53.4 percent of the project. The rest of the funds had to come from the seven sending communities of Berlin, Hudson, Marlborough, Maynard, Northborough, Southborough, and Westborough, and the vote to approve had to be unanimous.

“Those were long days and nights for more than two years as Pat (Collins) and I went to FinCom meetings, Select Board meetings, Appropriation Committee meetings, Town Meetings and City Council meetings to present our case, show the scope and sequence of what we wanted to do, and explained why all these changes to the school’s infrastructure were absolutely necessary after forty years. Understandably, our communities needed reassurances that these were not frivolous expenditures, and we were thrilled when vote after vote came in FOR the project. The day those construction trailers set up in our parking lot we all breathed a huge sigh of relief, but that was only the beginning, “explained Nawrocki in a statement.

The school’s infrastructure was renovated from the ground up, with new wiring and plumbing, new heating and cooling, a new roof, new all-purpose science labs, new ceilings, new insulation, new handicap accessibility, new fire and safety security systems, and a new dust collection system in the House Carpentry program.