ATLANTA—Infrastructure consultant AECOM will be leading a program management contract for the DeKalb County School District in Georgia as part of its Education Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (E-SPLOST) VI Capital Improvement Program. AECOM will be working with Corporate Environmental Risk Management (CERM), a certified minority-owned engineering and program management firm. The two companies have performed previous joint work for the district for over a decade.

Aspects of the work entail renovations, additions as well as ground-up work for the district. The companies will also be updating the technology throughout the district buildings as well as improving equipment. Together, CERM and AECOM will be undertaking scheduling, design standards review, contract administration and risk management.

“We’ve been honored to serve as DeKalb County School District’s program manager for 10 years and look forward to continuing to perform to a high level of technical excellence in this role,” Bane Gaiser, chief executive of AECOM’s U.S. East and Latin America region, said in a recent statement. “We’re especially proud to partner with CERM, capitalizing on the success and momentum from our previous work together—and leveraging our existing experience, knowledge of district processes, and alignment with various public and project stakeholders throughout the Atlanta region to together deliver equity, quality, and value across this program.”

Added Chris McDermott, senior vice president and lead of AECOM’s U.S. East and Latin America Program and project management business: “Through our efforts managing assignments for hundreds of K-12 school programs across the country, we’ve developed proven approaches focused on collaboration, communication, and cost-consciousness. These best practices help guide our outcome-driven solutions that prioritize our clients’ overall program goals while optimizing capital investments.

“We’re pleased to bring this depth of experience to support the DeKalb County School District’s vision of inspiring a community of learners to achieve educational excellence.”

The DeKalb County School District, the third-largest in all of Georgia, services 93,000 students. In addition to physical construction work, its Capital Improvement Program prioritizes such modern concepts as diversity and inclusion, facility equity, and sustainable innovations.

AECOM, a Fortune 500 firm, reports revenue of $13.3 billion in fiscal year 2021 alone.

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The community college currently educates more than 50,000 New Yorkers through degree, certificate and continuing education programs, and the library is the most heavily used space on campus.

“Our student population is largely low-income, new immigrant, or otherwise disadvantaged — many face numerous challenges on their way to a college degree, from financial burdens, juggling work (often more than one job), raising children, and other responsibilities — and they deserve and need a convenient, comfortable, modern space where they can grab time to study and reflect,” said La LaGuardia Community College President Gail O. Mellow in a statement.

The library expansion has been long overdue, Mellow added, and included converting the second floor of the college’s E-Building into an additional space for the existing library on the first floor. Making the library 58 percent larger and doubling its capacity to 732 seats, the expansion added 312 workstations with powered Internet connections at each, media rooms, 11 new group study rooms, new reading rooms, a new media lab, faculty suites, archive space and 50 new offices. It also included upgrading the first-floor library space and connecting the two spaces with a large staircase and enhanced elevator service.

The building’s previous second-floor space previously housed faculty offices and classrooms and has been converted to feature glazed divider walls, carpet flooring and fabric-wrapped wall panels for visual interest and acoustical control. A reference desk and computer desks mixed in with lounge-type tables and reading tables and chairs complete the space and allow for a flexible learning environment.

The new staircase is the highlight of the project. To create a seamless connection between both floors, the construction team removed the original stair from the main floor and cut an opening into the concrete slab of the new second-floor space to create a larger, more transparent staircase. It features wooden handrails and glazed sides as well as an all-glass opening on the second floor.

The biggest challenge for the project was that construction took place while the first-floor library was fully operational. In order to avoid disrupting student focus in the library, the construction team had to build its own scaffolding with stairs, a ramp and sidewalk bridge on the outside of the building in order to access the construction site. Materials were delivered either through the ramp or with a hoist through the second-floor opening. Even the new stair was delivered in sections through the exterior wall opening and assembled on site, according to a statement. Other aspects of the project — bathroom plumbing and air-conditioning, for example — were installed during school breaks and on weekends.

The library will now undergo a second phase of renovations that focus on the first floor and are based on input from students, faculty and staff.

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