SSHS completes renovations

Open house showcasing new wings set for Nov. 9

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Over the past 42 months, South Side High School has undergone a major facelift, improving its facilities as well as student safety thanks to a bond that had once been rejected.

Now the community will finally get a chance to see the results. On Nov. 9, South Side will host an open house, inviting residents to tour the school and see all the new amenities, including the library, the science and art wings, a virtual reality lab, and athletic facilities. New wings replace the portable classrooms that used to be on the south side of the building.

“We’ve never done it before,” South Side Principal John Murphy said of the open house. “We’re really proud of the new building. We’re just growing into it ourselves. We used the renovations as kind of a reason to show off the heart and soul of the school.”

Visitors will be greeted by representatives of the National Honor Society in the main lobby, given maps and a list of more than 85 activities that will be going on in the building, including clubs and other extracurricular activities, and tour the new wings with department spokespeople.

Local groups like the PTA, employees of the public library and the Rockville Centre Youth Coalition will also be in attendance that night, and there will be live music in the cafeteria.

Visitors will have a choice to go in two different directions: down the main hall to the science wing, or to the new art wing.

Murphy asked that students who take part wear the appropriate clothing. For example, athletes will wear their uniforms, while chamber singers will don concert attire. “That speaks to the culture of the building,” Murphy explained. “We’re not a series of separate, discrete parts. We’re a fabric where everyone intermingles, and, to celebrate that, the open house should reflect that, both in the attire and in the feeling and the environment.”

The work was funded by a $45 million bond that residents approved in March 2013, about four years after a $31.8 bond, intended for similar renovations at the high school, was rejected. About $30 million of the approved bond was directed to the work at the high school.

It also funded an expansion of Watson Elementary School, as well as many upgrades and renovations around the district, including the installation of air conditioning in every classroom. “The bond issue wasn’t just about the high school,” Murphy said. “There was a part of every school in the district that participated in the bond. Some of the renovations were minor, some were major.”

Some of the major renovations benefited the high school’s athletic teams. A new artificial-turf field was installed last year, and the fitness center was upgraded with new treadmills and other exercise machines, and new weights. The only area yet to be complete is the practice field adjacent to the main field.

The Board of Education approved a measure at its Oct. 19 meeting to allow the use of lights on the athletic field until 8 p.m. the night of the open house and the illumination of the upper walkway lights until 9, so visitors can see the field after dark.

More important than comfort, Murphy said, is that students are now safer when going to and from classes. “I think the focal point of the high school was that, in a lot of ways, not only were the facilities the oldest, but we were also the only building where students had to leave the physical main building in order to go to classes,” he said. “So there were serious safety as well as other issues at stake here.”

Despite all of the new classrooms, room numbers and flow charts that students had to learn, Murphy said, the first couple of months of school went better than expected. “There was a lot of planning at stake, but opening [the] school was without a hitch,” he said. “I think it’s a testament to the community and the teachers how smooth it went.”