Imagery of New Wilmington High School Released

A for Wilmington is slowly but surely becoming a reality as all the key players involved in the planning process met Monday night to discuss the progress made, and what's coming next. 

School officials and Board of Selectmen members decided on dates for a special town meeting and special election ballot that will ask voters if they approve of the construction, as well as to discuss the appropriation of funds.

The Special Election will be held on Tuesday, Dec. 6, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., and will include a single question for a "debt exclusion to raise funds in excess of the town's levy limit for the purpose of designing, permitting, constructing, furnishing, and equipping a new Wilmington High School in accordance with the High School Building Committee."

In addition, the officials approved a Special Town Meeting for residents to vote on the school at 10:30 a.m. on Saturday, Dec. 10.

The schematic design process has been underway since August, and will be continuing through November. The project is also going to have another public forum on Oct. 13, and then the proposal will be submitted to the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) on Oct. 7.

The MSBA will then meet on Nov. 16 and approve the project, and the Town Meeting and vote will come soon after.

The design development and construction documents (where the project gets documented and detailed) will be developed from Jan. 2012 - Oct. 2012, and construction will be commencing in early Summer 2012 and continuing through Fall 2014.

Substantial completion will be in June 2014, allowing school to open in the Fall of 2014. Construction will be ongoing while the existing high school is in place. Once the new high school is completed, the existing high school will be demolished with the new school being in full operation.

According to Donald M. Walter of Dore & Whittier Architects, Inc., the main entrance to the school will be on Church St., with two other primary entrances to the building. There will be a designated road for buses and other authorized vehicles to come through.

"One important aspect to this particular arrangement is the separation between the bus drop off and the parent drop off in order to keep buses and cars separate from each other," said Walter.

With the first floor including administration, guidance, a media center, a courtyard, alternative education, a cafeteria, an auditorium, and a gymnasium, it is on the second and third floors where Superintendent Joanne Benton's vision of will really come into play.

These floors will include many learning communities that will be organized and arranged as the school committee sees fit.

"[Superintendent Benton] emphasized 21st century learning, so what we've done is develop smaller learning communities to create opportunities for shared curriculum and collaboration," said Walter. "This allows students and staff to come out and come together in smaller spaces outside of the learning commons."

Also on the second and third floors will be special education resource centers spread throughout the learning communities in order to better connect these students with their classmates.

"What's important is the idea of inclusion when planning this building so that the special education students are actually out within the general public and population, spread throughout the building, and  fully engaged in the curriculum," said Walter.

The estimated project cost based on a feasibility study ranges between $78-80M, with an estimated local share of $40M.

"Yes, there is money that has to go out in order to get something in return, but we have to make it clear to the residents what they stand to gain," said Selectman Mike Champoux. "You can gain in character and defining who we are as a people, and a community. We define ourselves by the value that we put on education and our youth, we improve individual property values."

According to Walter, this number will become more concrete in the near future as the architects are required to have a solid number to present to the MSBA during November's board meeting.

A suggestion in order to ease the tax payer's burden was shared by Selectmen Michael McCoy. He proposed using the money that was accumulated by the recently instated meals tax towards construction in order for community members to get the best "bang for their buck."

Oct. 13 marks the next public forum on this topic, and Selectman Judith O'Connell encourages the people of Wilmington to get involved in these critical next few months.

"I just want to make sure that people stay tuned to all the media vehicles that are out there to see what call to action is coming forward. [They need to be aware] what are the next steps in process, so that they can be actively engaged as voting capable residents and be involved in the process," she said.