3 days ago
New ‘state-of-the-art' classrooms, playground ready at Franklin School
Teachers at Franklin Elementary School in Yuba City are jazzed about the four new classrooms that are now ready on the school's campus. Two of the new rooms are for kindergarteners, and the other two rooms are for transitional kindergarteners.
Superintendent and principal Lisa Shelton said the spaces are very nice, and that Meehleis Modular Buildings Inc. did an amazing job with them.
'They are just state of the art,' Shelton said.
The new connected rooms feature noticeably spacious classrooms, a peaked ceiling, red accents, bathrooms, connected workrooms and windows that face a walnut orchard that neighbors the school.
Sharon Carothers, a TK teacher at Franklin Elementary School, said the orchard belongs to her family; her cousin inherited it. For Carothers, the school itself is family.
'My mom and dad went to school here,' Carothers said.'I went to school here. My kids went to school here. This is family.'
Creating a family-friendly atmosphere, the school had a ribbon-cutting event on Tuesday where folks could check out the new classrooms; the classrooms were completed in May. Students at the school watched as the classrooms came together, and Project Manager Matt Meehleis said that that was the most rewarding part of it all.
Beyond the new classrooms, this construction project, which began around August, also involved the addition of a new playground for the youngest students at the school and enhanced parking.
The total cost of the project was around five million. For this project, they were able to secure a $4 million grant from the Office of Public School Construction. The Franklin Elementary School District also contributed approximately one million dollars to the project. Shelton spoke on the need for this project.
'We just were short (on) rooms,' Shelton said. 'We're adding another TK classroom and we did not have the available space, and the space we had was not code compliant. So this allowed us to have rooms that are compliant for TK and K.'
This project was guided by Title 5 and its requirements. Title 5 of the California Code of Regulations includes provisions that govern the design, construction and functionality of school facilities in California.
Because of this project, the school now has more space for TK students to enter the school, as the school went from having one TK classroom to two TK classrooms. Carothers thinks that TK gives the students a good boost for kindergarten.
'My goal isn't to teach them the academics of kindergarten, but to get them to be a student,' Carothers said.
She tells the parents that the academics are a bonus.
'So they will learn their sounds and their letters, count to 100, those are all the things that we work on to learn to be a student. So they'll repeat those things in kindergarten, but it just gets them ready, and it's familiar,' Carothers said. 'They're not scared that first day like they are (in) the first day of TK.'
