The Logan City School District Board of Education approved a proposal to build a new special education classroom at Bridger Elementary School over the summer. The project will allow the school to have two Essential Elements classrooms while they currently only have one.
Don Bell, the facilities manager for the district, said that there is a need to add more Essential Elements classrooms to accommodate current and future students. Essential Elements is a program that teaches students with a mental disability.
“This is the time of year that I compile the list of capital requests throughout the district and try to prioritize those to submit those to you for review in April,” Bell said.
“One of the requests that’s come up and been identified is a need for more Essential Elements classrooms at Bridger Elementary.”
Bell said that the reason he is bringing up this project with the council earlier than usual is that it will need to be started earlier to get done in time.
“It’s a big enough project that if I wait till April, we’re probably going to be behind to get it done before the start of school in the fall,” Bell said.
Bell said that the project needs to start getting plans drawn and getting bids out now so that it can start construction right after the school year ends. He said that the project is projected to cost between $250,000 and $300,000.
The proposal would split a learning center at Bridger Elementary into two sections to be used as the two new classrooms. It would also incorporate extra space from storage rooms and surrounding area into the new classrooms to allow them to be bigger.
The current room used as the sole Essential Elements classroom would be turned back into a kindergarten classroom.
Bell said that the learning center that will be turned into the new classrooms is an area of the hallway that can currently be sectioned off into a room.
“Those learning centers are expandable parts of the hallway,” Bell said. “They have an accordion type wall that can be folded out and made into a collaboration space or meeting space. But it’s not being utilized as a classroom currently.”
The new Essential Elements classrooms would take out the accordion walls and build normal ones.
Marci Elliott, the director of special education, said that this expansion is needed due to more incoming special education students. Elliott said that Bridger Elementary’s special education is already close to full, and is only losing one fifth grader after this year and will be gaining four to six new students.
Bell said that after talking with staff, the belief is that this change would resolve the need for special education classrooms at Bridger Elementary for at least the next five years.
After the presentation and discussion, the Logan City School District Board of Education approved the proposal unanimously.
