Highland School board weighs high school addition, delays design decision

By Brittany Blackwell,
Reporter • The Highland School District Board of Education is taking steps to advance early plans for a multi-million dollar fine arts and athletic facility but delayed a key decision on how to move forward with the project’s design. 

The facility would act as a secondary gym to support physical education classes, athletic contests and general use for the entire student body at Highland High School. The proposed facility would most likely be located on the east side of campus, near Route 160.

Highland High School currently has one gym and with roughly 800 to 900 students, Superintendent Mike Sutton said it can be difficult to schedule contests. 

“We have a tremendous number of extracurriculars,” he said. “They are all competing for gym space while we are trying to schedule our contents.”

Sutton said sports such as basketball, wrestling and volleyball can be especially difficult to schedule. 

“It’s an inadequate facility, so we’ve been talking about upgrades to combine the weight room, second gym and fine arts area into one project,” he said. 

In addition to enhanced support for sporting events, the plan includes an expansion of physical education activities during the school day. The fine arts area would be especially suited for band students. 

Sutton said administration surveyed area schools and Highland High School is one of the few that only have one gym. 

The need for another gym is the result of strategic planning conducted years ago. Needs within the district were assessed and the top three priorities were determined. While those projects have been completed at some of the other schools through a $40 million referendum, the fourth was a weight room at the high school.

Over the past couple months, board members have discussed the feasibility of a second gym to comprise features such as the weight room, fine arts area and locker rooms. 

During the March 23 school board meeting, the discussion centered on how to approach the next phase for preliminary programming and schematic designs. The project’s initial cost is estimated to be approximately $14 to $17 million. 

After deliberation about design-build vs design-bid-build, the board agreed to table the item to gather more information and is expected to revisit the issue at a future meeting. 

The board will later begin outreach efforts to explain the project’s scope to taxpayers and plans for the project to be structured with no increase to the current tax rate, assuming steady property value growth. The project is expected to be put before voters as a referendum on a future election ballot.