Chief Operating Officer Mr. Rolly Landeros says final plans are being made for the new Innovation Center, with work beginning this summer. 

The Innovation Center will provide new science and engineering labs, a new cafeteria and a new spirit shop. Landeros said, “The new spirit shop will remain close to the new cafeteria.”  

During construction, classes in B basement will be reassigned to free classrooms because that space will be converted to be the new kitchen for the cafeteria. Landeros said, “In total, we will lose five classrooms during construction so we have to relocate them to existing or available spaces. Once construction is complete, we will have six new academic labs.”  

As part of the new spirit shop relocation, there will be a new delivery entrance that will provide direct access to the spirit shop from the parking lot. “We hope this will provide better accessibility to parents and guests,” Landeros said. 

“Plans for what happens to our current cafeteria will be discussed as part of our master planning process, which will happen this summer,” said Landeros.

“The new building will be the new heart of the campus because the new cafeteria and the Shiel Student Life Center commons will be connected to each other,” said Landeros.

The current student entrance and main stairwell will be completely replaced. “A new student entrance from the courtyard will ramp down a level and lead directly into the bottom floor of the new building, ” Landeros said. The Student Life Center stairs going to the courtyard will also be removed. “This whole section will be changed,” said Landeros.

The main floor of the Innovation Center will include new labs for physics, engineering, robotics and computer programming.  The top floor will have new biology, chemistry and organic chemistry labs.  

Landeros said ground will be broken sometime this summer. “We’re anticipating in between 16 to 20 months of construction once we break ground,” he said. 

“This Innovation Center will start a transformation of the entire school, to show that we can have innovative spaces for the next generation of students. We are hoping the Innovation Center will be done by January of 2022,” said Landeros.

Landeros said that when you think about all the projects done on this campus, the Innovation Center will transform how teachers teach and students learn. Landeros said, “There will be some interesting challenges but incredible opportunities to provide students the best spaces to learn and grow.”

Landeros said he will provide an update after March 16.