ATLANTA—Building and infrastructure firm Balfour Beatty has completed improvements to the West Manor Elementary School in Atlanta’s Lynhurst neighborhood. The elementary school falls under the umbrella of the Atlanta Public Schools entity.

The contractor was able to complete the renovation work nearly three months ahead of schedule, the firm announced recently. The design partner on the project was Collins Cooper Carusi Architects.

Renovations entailed work on both the interior and exterior. Balfour Beatty commenced the work at West Manor in June 2020. During the accelerated work schedule, the contractor added and/or renovated 52,000 square feet of educational space.

New spaces include a gym and a performance hall and meeting spaces. The work also entailed installing a new roof, sprinkler system and refining the HVAC system from the ground up. Additionally, administrative space for staff was added. Balfour Beatty also added additional classrooms for music, language and arts instruction. On the outside, the parking area was expanded and right-of-way improved.

Balfour Beatty utilized lean construction techniques to push forward the projected date of delivery to the school district. They also applied “value engineering” to save money on the roof renewal and HVAC updating.

In a recent statement, Mike Macon, Balfour Beatty senior vice president in Georgia, said that his firm was proud to work with Atlanta Public Schools on West Manor Elementary School.

“Throughout the lifecycle of the project, our team leveraged our industry experience in K-12 construction while remaining agile and consistently collaborating with Atlanta Public Schools to complete this project nine weeks ahead of schedule,” Macon said.

Added Theondrae Reid, project manager for Atlanta Public Schools: “I’ve had the pleasure of working with Balfour Beatty on three consecutive school projects, and their proactive approach in providing creative construction solutions has exceeded our district’s goals and expectations to create dynamic learning environments for the Lynhurst community and beyond.”

West Manor Elementary School is located at 570 Lynhurst Drive SW, and is now open for in-person instruction.

The post Balfour Beatty Rolls Out Renovations at Atlanta School appeared first on School Construction News.

ATLANTA — The national firm of JE Dunn Construction was chosen by Atlanta Public Schools (APS) to begin converting an existing middle school into a new elementary school, Harper-Archer Elementary, for the school system’s Douglass Cluster of physically close elementary, middle and high schools.

The $7.8 million project will cover roughly 140,000 square feet, transforming classrooms to meet elementary curriculum standards, interior upgrades and adjustments to HVAC, electrical and plumbing systems. The transformation follows the Atlanta Board of Education voting 7-2 to approve changes to regional schools, including consolidations and closures, at a meeting in March 2017, as reported by the Atlanta Patch.

While some student parents are upset because of the changes, according to the Atlanta Patch, APS Superintendent Meria J. Carstarphen stood by the decision, saying that impacted schools had low enrollment, and students weren’t keeping up academically with much of the district. She added that the realignments would save teachers from exhaustion and improve test scores and described the transition plan as  “academically based and child focused.”

APS is one of the largest school districts in the state of Georgia, serving approximately 50,000 students across 106 learning sites, according to a statement. The district is organized into nine K-12 clusters with 87 schools, 17 charter schools and two city-wide single-gender academies. The elementary students whose schools were closed will be moved to the new Harper-Archer Elementary to begin a new academic year. The renovation will bring the students a new media center and new STEM labs, with graphics and bright colors in the finishes to appeal to the young students.

Construction is scheduled to begin in June 2018, with Phase I and III operating over summer vacation, while Phase II will occur with the eighth grade students still in the building. The construction team will have to coordinate the new work with years of past renovations. The project is scheduled to be completed for the start of the 2019-2020 school year.

The post JE Dunn Construction Selected to Convert Atlanta Middle School appeared first on School Construction News.

According to Ken Trump, president of National School Safety and Security Services, as time passes schools should remain committed to school safety as well as utilize increased communication and emergency protocol versus increased security technology.

“We’re happy to see schools doing things again with security and preparedness efforts. We just wish school boards and superintendents would sustain that level of interest and activities when there is not a crisis in the forefront of everyone’s minds and parent demand to know what their schools are doing to strengthen safety,” Trump said. “Smart superintendents, principals and school boards recognize that proactive security and preparedness efforts are not only the right thing to do, but also a strong tool for strengthening school community trust and confidence in their leadership.”

Since the Sandy Hook shootings, Trump said, there have been some schools that have taken school security to what he considers ridiculous extremes such as bulletproof backpacks, bulletproof whiteboards and teaching students as well as teachers to throw things or attack an armed gunmen.

“These all meet the emotional security needs, but in reality will do little — and may even create a false sense of unrealistic security — to actually make kids, teachers and schools more safe,” Trump said.

The most essential school security needs are much more discreet and less fad-driven, Trump said. Utilizing Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design in new buildings and renovations, schools can provide substantial security improvements such as reconfiguring main entranceways and enhancing hallway supervision with improved sight lines.

“It’s easy to point to more cameras or additional police at a school, neither of which onto their own are bad things, but it’s harder to point to adults building relationships with kids, improved counseling and mental health support, regular planning and cross training with first responders, and diversified lockdown, evacuation, fire and other drills – all of which truly make schools safer,” Trump said.

Security technology does not need to be extensive, Trump said, and most schools lack the budget necessary to purchase new technologies that do not, in most cases, blend with the school environment. Therefore, schools should seek out increased day-to-day supervision techniques and training staff, as well as students, appropriately.

“Superintendents, principals, and school boards must invest as much, if not more, in their people and in dedicating time to safety and preparedness planning as they do in physical security enhancements,” Trump said. “Too often we see well-intended school leaders who will be quick to drop some dollars for physical security equipment they can point to when talking with parents, but they are much more guarded in releasing time for training school staff, diversifying their lockdown or evacuation drills and doing meaningful, detailed planning with their first responders.”

The post Students Return to School Security Updates appeared first on School Construction News.