Mar 20, 2021 3 min read

Some finishing touches at the new Peters Township High School are proceeding smoothly.

During Monday’s school board meeting, on-site construction manager Stephen Reckhart of SitelogIQ, the construction management firm for the project, provided updates regarding the work that continues on the school’s auditorium and natatorium.

“We think by the end of this month that the auditorium will be ready,” he said. “The auditorium seating is all in place, and they’ve been working on the aisle lighting and should, next week, start putting the carpet down. After that, the last thing is just a good cleanup.”

In the natatorium, work is wrapping up on the sprinkler system, which will complete the fire protection system for the school.

“They have the slabs poured around the pool. The electrician is currently working on getting the lights roughed in and will be hanging lights soon,” Reckhart said. “All the trades seem to be working fairly well together, sharing lifts and getting all the overhead work done.”

School board member Minna Allison, who co-chairs the board’s ad hoc fundraising committee with Jennifer Grossman, said the group met recently to discuss providing opportunities for potential purchasers of naming rights, along with the general public, to see the new school firsthand.

“The committee recommends that we have two events, one a smaller type of ribbon cutting,” Allison said, “and then another date where we do tours and open it up to the community.”

Events along those lines had been scheduled following the school’s mid-January opening, but they were canceled because of continuing measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

“We have these limitations during the school year, so we were hoping we would do both of these events sometime after graduation,” Allison said. “That is also advantageous because our pool would be completed by that time, so that if we are doing tours, people would actually be able to see the whole building.”

As soon as students and staff members moved to the new building, work began on converting the former high school to the district’s new middle school, scheduled to open by the start of the next academic year.

Reckhart, whose firm also is managing the conversion project, gave a report on its progress so far, including a positive note about replacing part of the building’s roof.

“The weather’s been great, so they’re making good headway on the old auditorium roof,” he said. “Most of the demolition is done on the inside. We still have some ceilings to tear out.”

On the exterior, a portion of wall has been torn out for construction of a new entrance to the school’s administrative area, to be built in the former natatorium area.

“The contractor has most of the fill placed inside the old pool,” Reckhart said. “I anticipate that in about another week, they should be pouring the floor slab in there, so we can proceed with wall framing and duct work and piping in there.”