Renovations to Owensboro Middle School include extending and adding a second floor to one corridor, relocating and expanding the fine arts area, adding a courtyard, and other upgrades throughout the building, according to the final design schematic drawing approved Thursday.
There is still no timeline for when renovations will begin, as there are more planning phases that must occur first and the Kentucky Department of Education also has to sign off on any plans.
For now, OMS and district officials are just happy to finally have an end goal laid out.
“There’s a lot up in the air, but this is the finished design,” said John David Sandefur, Owensboro Public Schools chief financial officer. “We know what the administrators want. Now (the engineers and contractors) take that plan and run with it and say ‘okay, how do we make it all work?’”
According to the schematic drawing approved by the OPS Board of Education, the renovated building will span 168,272 square feet.
The corridor that runs along South Griffith Avenue will be extended further south, lining up with the end of the south gym. A second floor of classrooms will also be added on to the entire corridor.
The fine arts area that is currently at the northeast corner of the property will essentially be relocated and redesigned to sit between the newly extended corridor and the south gym. The plan calls for rooms for dance (1,765 square feet), band ensemble (650), band (1,850), choir (900), orchestra ensemble (650), orchestra (2,050), and theatre (900).
There will also be a 611-seat auditorium with a 50-foot-wide stage.
The other two major changes would be a renovated administrative office suite to allow for a safer entry point and to provide extra space, along with the addition of a courtyard centrally located on the campus.
Sandefur said the rest of the building will also undergo renovations to give a facelift to the entire campus.
“By the time they’re done, the whole building will have been touched,” he said. “There’ll be pieces that are added on, pieces that are torn down. It’ll be very similar to what happened at Cravens Elementary School, as far as when you walk in it feels like a new building.”
