by SABRINA RICHARD - Students reflect on new construction updates in school.
The first-ever college tour I went on was to University of Kentucky, and the guide wisely told us, “Never trust a school without construction, it means they aren’t growing.” With almost 2,500 students and many more next year (all of whom need classrooms, lockers and spaces to walk [on the right side of the hallway--and I said walk, not stop and talk in the middle of the hallway!]), we may experience growing pains in the form of moving classrooms or testing to the melody of jackhammers. It is a part of WHS’s coming of age.
Since school started, students and teachers alike have had to change classrooms and adapt to entire stairwells unavailable.
“The school is turning into a log cabin,” Alex Coulombe (11) said. “There is so much wood and plywood everywhere.”
After the second trimester ended, the new Learning Center and stairs were unveiled, and students started to use them to get to class or study on the larger steps.
“Everybody walks up the thick stairs,” Lucy Cummings (10) said. “Greg [Gerardot (10)] is planning on putting in a new slide.”
One design quality of interest to many students are the windows. With exterior windows going up in the new wing and the future “fishbowl” classrooms, students are starting to see a new WHS take shape.
“The new windows aren’t symmetrical,” Coulombe said. “It’s like one long window, then just a square.”
Others express excitement for changes in Westfield.
“Carmel is jelly of all of our windows,” Cummings said, speculating ours were superior.
Either way, Westfield construction continues and is set for completion by fall of 2020.
“The setbacks of having to deal with construction daily are frustrating, but I’m excited to see the new changes and the modernization of the school,” Coulombe said.