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It’s cold and drizzly in Thorndike, but inside the lobby of the new K–12 school, it’s warm and bright. In the elementary hallway a group of young children pass quietly like ducks in a line, halting before they enter the classroom. One girl takes the opportunity to gaze up at the fanciful artwork of bugs and plants hanging from the ceiling. While many schools are unmercifully utilitarian in design, the new Mt. View School’s architects, Oak Point Associates, added light, space, and artistic touches to make it a great place to be, no matter the weather outside.
Before the new school opened in the fall of 2009, students and teachers had to contend with an overcrowded, poorly insulated school that was not equipped to handle the electrical needs of the technology essential to modern learning, let alone accommodate the diverse needs of students from grades K–12. Now, the hallways are spacious, the classrooms comfortable and age-appropriate, and the school is geared up with top-of-the-line technology.
The atmosphere has boosted morale for faculty and staff, says Craig Tozier, a technology and business teacher who has taught in the school system for 23 years. “It makes you want to work another 23 years,” Tozier says.
MSAD #3 superintendent, Joseph Mattos, is buoyant as he cruises through the halls, pointing out the school’s best touches. There’s a pellet boiler system in the basement, which heats the school with Maine wood and saves money over the old oil furnace. High-tech sun catchers sit outside the classroom windows, funneling sunlight into the rooms indirectly so there’s ample natural light and never a glare. Light sensors detect when there is enough natural light in a classroom, and shut off the lights automatically to save on energy. And in each classroom, a SMART Board interactive whiteboard has taken the place of the chalkboards from yesteryear, allowing teachers to bring their lesson plans to life and engage their students.
“Technology is just rich here,” says Mattos. “That’s one of the ways you can level the playing field if you’re a rural community.”
While some of the school’s energy efficiency comes from new technologies, much of it also comes from careful design. To keep energy costs down, architects had to find a way for 1,000 students in 13 grades to share resources.
“The biggest challenge was trying to create three schools within a school,” says Rob Tillotson, president of Oak Point Associates.
Oak Point architects worked closely with Mt. View staff and the community to strike a balance between having the elementary, middle, and high schools share facilities without having seniors tripping over kindergarteners. Each level’s main classrooms are in separate wings, but they share common ace—the music department, cafeteria, and the performing arts center.
To make this workable, the architects incorporated modular design. This keeps space flexible for whatever use is needed. “It’s definitely bigger and more efficient,” Tillotson says.
No one’s complaining about the extra elbow room. District communities had long outgrown the old school before the new school opened. Little about the old school met modern state building codes by the time it closed, including walls filled with asbestos. But overcrowding was the worst problem, Mattos says. In the old school’s last days, 12 mobile classrooms were needed to handle all the students.
“It was really this small core building that was pretty beat up, surrounded by this small forest of mobile classrooms,” says Steve Cole, sustainable communities director for Coastal Enterprises, an organization that hopes to raise funds for a school windmill.
In a nod to the past, the new school incorporates elements from the old one, including a mural of designs taken from the old gym floor and an antique blue radiator that was a favorite spot on a winter day.
A new favorite spot is the Clifford Performing Arts Center. Today, the rock and jazz class, made up of a group of middle school students and teacher Mike Flagg, are practicing for a schoolwide gig.
Flagg seems to be everywhere at once as the band tries to perform the Surfaris’ “Wipeout” without derailing. During a break, he gently urges a saxophonist who is hiding in the wings to join the music. A run-through of Tom Petty’s “Freefalling” goes better.
Flagg says he loves the new school because arts are given a prominent place here. Before, the auditorium doubled as the cafeteria.
The original design for the performing arts center was for a flat-floor, flat-ceiling auditorium, but a community nonprofit, called Future MSAD #3, fundraised an extra $640,000 through grants and donations to make it a true venue for theater and music. There’s a catwalk for lighting, a projection booth, and a slanted seating area for better viewing.
“There isn’t a bad seat in the house,” says Alicia J. Nichols, campaign director for Future MSAD #3. With money leftover from the campaign, Future MSAD #3 started an endowment to provide for the arts center’s upkeep.
MSAD #3 is not a rich district, but the group raised more than half a million dollars in 17 months. Nichols credits the hard work and dedication of Future MSAD #3’s board of directors and community members for the fundraising success. The campaign borrowed from the private school model of raising capital, tapping former alumni for donations, and reaching out to foundations for grants. A $250,000 matching grant for the arts center by the Unity Foundation was instrumental, she says.
“Having everything matched by the Unity Foundation was like rocket fuel for the campaign,” Nichols says.
The group is now in the quiet phase of a campaign to complete the athletic field facilities.
The beautiful school is no less than the students deserve, says Superintendent Mattos. It took 10 years to get it built, from state approval to construction. It was a decade where students made due with a school building in decay, he says.
“They were like second-class citizens,” says Mattos, his face frowning slightly for a moment at the memory. Then he looks at the new school and brightens. “This is like the Taj Mahal compared to that.”
