Over the summer and during the first weeks of school, furniture, a sign and a mural were added to the high school building in an attempt to gauge students’ and staff members’ interest in future renovations.
The High School Improvements Team, a group that began meeting in January, has been finding ways to modify and add spaces to the school where students and faculty can work and socialize. The group hopes to make the school more comfortable.
Assistant Principal for Student Life Quinn Killy and Director of Operations and Innovation Tim Lyons are co-chairs of the High School Improvements Team. The group is composed of staff members from different departments and six students. Lyons hopes he can raise the number of students so they will make up the majority of the committee.
During summer break, a new green sign labeling the high school building was installed above the entrance. Inside the high school, couches were placed on L1 and the first floor. The doors next to the Hop Shop were replaced with a wall, creating a nook with chairs and a coffee table. A mural depicting a forest was put in the Internet Cafe after school started.
Last year, students Julian Montes-Sharp, Katherine Davies and Annabel Hilzenrath from YPAR, a research-based class, attended and contributed to meetings. The Student Staff Council (SSC) has also helped the High School Improvements Team plan renovations.
Montes-Sharp, who is currently a senior and SSC president, said the Improvements Team asked SSC members for feedback. At SSC meetings, Killy presented the renovations the Improvements Team was proposing, and students voiced their ideas and reactions.
“The High School Improvements Team uses what’s called a user-centered design,” Lyons said. According to Lyons, the team considers the perspectives of different groups of people in the school and determines how the high school can best be improved to suit the interests of students and faculty.
In meetings last school year, members of the Improvements Team brainstormed potential additions to the school, deciding whether to add furniture and decor and discussing how to undergo renovations.
“Our main mode is trying things, and if things get a lot of enthusiasm, we’ll try to do them more broadly,” Lyons said.
One small-scale project was repainting trim on the first floor. “We did it just to that one hallway, so we’re trying to see if anybody notices,” Lyons said.
Plans to completely remake the high school were introduced and scrapped last year. Administrators concluded that the project would be too disruptive to students’ lives and too expensive. The High School Improvements Team was created after these renovations were discontinued to implement smaller, more attainable projects around the school, such as adding or moving furniture.
Killy and Lyons said that the Improvements Team is beginning with small changes to get feedback from students and staff. “If, and when, we do a bigger renovation in years to come, we have some ideas on what furniture people liked,” Killy said.
While the High School Improvements Team has not yet met this school year and last convened in May, Lyons said he hopes to begin meeting in 2024.
Lyons said he intends to send a Google Form for students to give feedback on the design changes that have been made.
Four students interviewed by the Bit said they did not notice all of the small-scale renovations.
“There hasn’t really been a lot of new renovations that I have seen,” junior Shanwai Lin said. “But I like what the school has done with the couches and furniture next to the Hop Shop. There isn’t a ton of space for everyone on the junior couches, so it’s good they’re making more room.”
“I like the new mural in the Internet Cafe,” senior Shaan Desai said. “When I saw it, I immediately felt that it added something to the space.”
Killy said the mural, couches and seating nook, which were added to the Internet Cafe, were inspired by conversations with SSC members.
“I want a new carpet for the Forum,” sophomore Alexander Bobo said. The current carpet “is very dirty. Every single morning, it’s very smelly.”
“I think the school is all right as it is — I don’t really see any big room for improvement,” sophomore Dominic Bloch-Prime said. “The biggest thing they could do is add an affordable cafeteria.”
Senior Jason Adler had a different idea for school improvements. Adler suggested installing “those Costco massage chairs and maybe, like, a bed.”
Ananth Mangalam ’27 contributed reporting to this story.