June 7, 2023 at 3:52 p.m.
SCPS board digs education foundation
Construction underway on elementary school renovation, addition
The Sauk Centre Public Schools Board took up shovels June 5 to break ground on the elementary school’s early childhood center addition, part of the building renovation project.
“We’re thrilled to be able to break ground tonight,” said Andy Fields with SitelogIQ. “This is something that is so special to this community. It’s going to change the way kids learn, it’s going to change the way your educators educate … and so we’re happy to share that moment with you.”
Prior to the groundbreaking, the board heard a project update from consulting firm SitelogIQ June 5 at the board’s committee meeting in the school media center. There were some delays in the permitting process for code, structural and overall reviews, and while the elementary school’s precast concrete delivery and gas utilities relocation are still a work in progress, electrical relocation has been completed.
Teams are working on shifting the early childhood and Kid Connection areas of the school to another location on campus until construction concludes. Even if the work is not complete, SitelogIQ anticipates some areas will be opened for classroom preparation ahead of the 2023-24 school year.
SitelogIQ is also interested in setting up a mySiteIQ online platform to support SCPS in the long term. The platform would have the school’s assets listed and provide up-to-date assessments on how long they are supposed to last and how much it would cost to replace them. The site would help SCPS with their long-term facility maintenance plan.
“I think this will help,” Superintendent Don Peschel said. “We’ve got eyes on certain things in our building we know we’ll need to have improvements on, and now we have a tool that’ll help justify what we’re doing.”
After the meeting and groundbreaking, the board toured the elementary school to see how far renovations had progressed.
The elementary school addition and reconstruction represent the first phase of the renovation project and is expected to be finished in the fall. The second phase, focusing on the middle and high schools, is scheduled to begin spring of 2024 and conclude in the fall of that same year.
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