Project of the Year!

Today, we had the pleasure of attending a Masonry Institute of Hawaii luncheon to celebrate our classroom building being named as their Project of the Year!

Kendall Ellingwood and Kanako Suzuki from our architectural firm, Design Partners, Inc. prepared this presentation about the project.  Their photos really show the uniqueness of our building, and I think that everyone was impressed with the vibrant interior colors as well as the functionality and very professional-looking exterior. I know that many of our visitors, when seeing the new buildings, are surprised that they are looking at a school. I learned new information, too, about why concrete blocks are the material of choice for its versatility, sustainability, and efficiency.

Here are some photos from the luncheon and award presentation.

Representatives from all those who made this project possible - the Department of Education, S&M Sakamoto, Design Partners, Inc., Ono Construction, and SSFM International

The slide presentation was so professionally done with great photos of our building - not at all like my iPhone photos that are posted on this blog :-) 

Kendall Ellingwood from Design Partners, Inc. shared the journey of our buildings from planning to construction and now, a 21st century learning space for our students and teachers

The award - a beautiful plaque 

To the whole team who made this award possible - MAHALO!

January 26, 2016

We see steady progress being made on the final phase of our construction project. Windows are going up in the library media/student center, and it looks like the CMU walls are just about done on the covered play court. We continue to keep our fingers crossed that the special education classroom will be occupied soon but we continue to wait for final documents to be approved.

The second floor tech lab overlooks the library. It'll be awesome when it's done!

Work continues on the CMU walls for the covered play court.

Windows were installed - view from the parking lot of the library media center . . .  

. . . . and the view from the back.  This was last week.
Today, I noticed that the windows on the far right were done, but I didn't take a photo.

Looks like the CMU walls are done . . . now it's time for the structural beams for the roof (I think).
We can't wait to be able to use this building!

January 7, 2016

Happy New Year! Today was our students' first day back from winter break, an appropriate time to update this blog. I was on vacation for much of the break, so I didn't have an opportunity to take too many photos.

Here are some updated photos of the project since the last post back on December 24.

We have been trying to find a way to keep the rubber tile flooring in the administration and classroom buildings clean. The custodians have tried so many different ways to clean those floors with no success. Finally, we were able to purchase some equipment to clean and buff the tiles, and then the custodians applied a special wax. The floors look awesome, and we can only surmise that those vendors who said the rubber tiles would not need wax have never encountered Wahiawa red dirt! The new building rubber tile floors will definitely be buffed and waxed before we move in!

When I came in one day during the break, Portable 4 was sitting smugly in the middle of the parking lot across the street. Apparently, the police escort had not shown up the previous night so the movers could not transport the portable off-campus. They did show up on a subsequent evening and Portables 4 and 5 were officially removed from the campus. 

Workers were getting ready for a concrete pour for the sidewalk fronting the school.  

Thank you to our SASA, Cathy Ferreira, for taking these photos of the concrete pour.

Smoothing the concrete for the sidewalk

Our students can learn a lesson from these workers about how everyone needs to together to get the job done. 

This empty space is where Portables 4 and 5 were located. When the whole project is finished, students will have a bigger area to play during recess or PE.

The sidewalk is partially done; the rest of the pour won't happen until after most of the work is done on the library media/student center.

Custodians were repainting the benches; they get so dirty and we decided to paint them a darker color. We'd sure appreciate it if everyone kept the benches clean!