The School District of Rhinelander will be making major changes in the high school and James Williams Middle School over the next couple of years.
At the middle school, there will be a new, more secure entrance as well as special education and art classrooms.
At the high school, the tech ed spaces and equipment will be updated and there will be an addition of a construction lab and auto lab.
The science classrooms will also be upgraded.
Superintendent Eric Burke says staff have been meeting with Bray Architects throughout the summer to give their input.
“Each part of the project, whether it be our tech ed spaces, or our science labs, or our at the middle school, we have our special education classrooms, and we have our art rooms, the teachers are directly involved in creating their vision for what those spaces could look like. Then we're going through those ideas and working with our construction people, and making sure that it fits within our budget,” said Burke.
The majority of the construction is being paid for by the $26 million referendum voters approved in April.
Local businesses and community members have also been contributing, especially in the tech ed spaces.
Dr. Lee Swank contributed $500,000 which Burke says has been critical for getting grants like those from the Department of Workforce Development that require matching funds.
The district was recently awarded $46,000 from the DWD to help purchase three laser engravers.
“Some of these engravers are bigger, so we can do bigger things with our students and our projects,” said Burke. “They're learning tons of obviously creativity, problem solving skills, and this type of product is used currently in the workforce. It's great for our kids learn how to use it.”
Burke says more local businesses have been reaching out to see how they can support the tech eds.
Those donations will be important to the longevity of those classes.
“We're going to be able to outfit our spaces with all the equipment that we feel is important to be able to put in those spaces, but we want to make sure we have funds to constantly update over the years because this referendum may not happen again for a long time,” said Burke. “We want to make sure that we have not only district funds, but also possibly some donations be able to make keep this going and keep things updated, keep it maintained.”
Burke says he’ll have a more formalized donation plan following the August school board meeting, but he does plan for there to be donor wall in the tech ed labs similar to the one at the Hodag Dome.
Construction is expected to start in April 2025 with the goal of wrapping up by the end of summer 2026.
Burke says a large part of the planning is to make sure it doesn’t disrupt classes.
