LAKE COUNTY, Colo.—Construction has begun on a new PreK-2 primary school in Leadville, Colo., for the Lake County School District. Excavation began in early May at the West Park Elementary School site for a facility that is scheduled to be ready for students in August 2021.

Last November, Lake County voters approved a bond proposal that cleared the way for the district to receive a $20.8 million Building Excellent Schools Today grant. The new $34.7 million school will serve students that attend West Park and Pitts elementary school, which the Colorado Department of Education has ranked among the facilities with the poorest conditions in the state.

“This new PK–2 school is such an important project for the future of our community,” said West Park Elementary School Principal Kathleen Fitzsimmons in a statement.

“Due to the pandemic, we held an informal groundbreaking ceremony aligned with social-distancing protocols. However, we will involve the whole community in celebrations at a later date.”

The groundbreaking involved months of work by the district’s Design Advisory Group, comprising staff and community members. The group provided input and guidance to Dynamic Program Management, the district’s owner’s representative, and to Hord Coplan Macht, the project’s architectural firm. FCI Contractors is the general contractor.

The new PK–2 building will include spaces that support student collaboration as well as a large gym for student and community use. The facility will also include a large gym for student and community use.

“These are challenging times for everyone,” said Lake County School District Superintendent Wendy Wyman. “In many ways, the new PK-2 school is a beacon of hope for students, teachers and families in our community. It’s a reminder that, in the future, there will be a return to normalcy. We can’t wait for students to fill our buildings again. It is exciting that, in the not-too-distant future, our youngest students will have access to a new building designed to enhance their learning and promote their wellbeing.”

Demolition of the old West Park school is slated for the fall 2021 after students have started in the new school building. Paving and final landscaping will take place in the summer of 2022.

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SANTA ROSA, Calif.—After learning that economically disadvantaged schools in Sonoma County lacked basic resources for distance learning, North Bay Area-based Quattrocchi Kwok Architects (QKA) took immediate action to bridge the “digital divide” preventing some of the neediest students from an education during COVID. QKA has stepped up to the plate to the tune of 80 Wi-Fi hotspots for families without access, 330 reams of copier paper, and $2,500 to help feed families in need.

Co-founder and Principal Mark Quattrocchi personally reached out to schools in Sonoma and Lake Counties and took stock of what resources were most immediately needed. For some schools, it was as basic as copiers and copy paper to make take-home packets for distance learning. In other cases, it was Wi-Fi hotspots to grant kids Wi-Fi access who previously could not join their peers for digital learning.

Here is a complete list of what materials/funding were provided and where:

Two Rock School
26 hotspots with 3-month subscription plan – allows access to all cell carriers; a critical need, particularly in rural areas with limited cell coverage
3 cases or 30-reams of copier paper

Roseland Family Food Relief Fund
Donation of $2,500 used by families in need to buy groceries locally

Donation of $1,000 on behalf of QKA from Jeff Warner of Warner Mechanical Engineering (inspired by QKA’s donation)

Roseland University Prep
11 hotspots with 3-month subscription plan

Roseland Creek ES
3 hotspots with 3-month subscription plan
10 cases or 100 reams of copier paper

Roseland ES
10 cases or 100 reams of copier paper

Sheppard ES
10 cases or 100 reams of copier paper

Lake County Schools
20 Wi-Fi Hotspots

“For years, I’ve been aware of the educational inequities that exist in communities of color and economically disadvantaged schools.  When the Coronavirus struck, it shined an even brighter light on this unlevel playing field as these districts tried to implement distance learning,” said Mark Quattrocchi, QKA founding principal. “The nexus for my reaching out to rural and economically disadvantaged schools was an article published in a local North Bay paper, The Press Democrat, which specifically listed Two Rock and Kashia Schools as those struggling to overcome connectivity barriers and a lack of resources. I reached out to those as well as other local schools I was aware may be having trouble, most of which are not out clients. As we have been so fortunate to continue working and moving projects forward during this time, we feel it is our privilege to support local students who have already experienced so much upheaval.”

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The Lake County district, which serves approximately 42,000 students across 51 learning sites, needed to align with the recently passed requirement to permit students to apply to any public school throughout the state. Though the expanded school choice is a boon to families, it can be a burden to districts managing outdated enrollment and records systems.

“We knew it was important to invest in a simplified, scalable solution from an experienced technology provider to help our families navigate the state’s expanded school choice process,” said Julie Summerlin, supervisor of Choice, Charter and Community Education of Lake County Schools, in a statement. “SchoolMint’s flexibility in allowing us to configure lotteries and preferences as required by the state law, as well as the company’s overall expertise in the field, made them the right partner for our district.”

Since its founding in 2013, close to 6,000 schools have chosen SchoolMint to facilitate myriad aspects of student enrollment — from registration management to application, lottery oversight and even the management of digital forms and related uploadable documents. Lake County joins districts such as Boston Public Schools, Camden City School District, Chicago Public Schools, Cleveland Metropolitan School District, Denver Public Schools, Oakland Unified School District and Spring Branch Independent School District in implementing the system.

According to a TechCrunch article, in early 2016 SchoolMint raised $5.6 million in a round of funding that boasted a gallery of education- and government-focused investors. Among them was institutional investors Maiden Lane Ventures and CSC Upshot (one of China’s top three private equity firms, with $14 billion under management, according to Crunchbase).

When using such systems, school districts may increase family engagement, improve operational efficiency and obtain greater analytic and planning insights through the platform’s reporting tools. Also, there’s an app for that.

“As an increasing number of districts across the country are expanding choice and school options for their families, we are honored that more school systems, like Lake County, are looking to SchoolMint for our expertise in school choice,“ said Jinal Jhaveri, founder and CEO of SchoolMint, in a statement. “SchoolMint offers the system and the tools to make the school choice application process transparent, equitable and more accessible for families. And we are encouraged by the interest we are seeing among Florida’s school districts, given the state’s unique school choice requirements.”

Presently, the company has little in the way of competition since it’s only competitor, Infosnap, was acquired by PowerSchool, another K-12 education technology provider, narrowing the field as it addresses the state’s unique choice requirements.

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