WINDHAM — High-tech Windham High School is arts friendly, too.
Count Middle School eighth-graders Meagan Eccleston, Karissa Edelstein and Christopher Jones as fans of the 195,000-square-foot school, set to open this fall.
Karissa said the building is filled with light. Library walls are made of glass.
Christopher said each classroom and wing has its own look.
"It has a modern feel," Meagan said.
Each of the students was enamored of the building during a recent visit to deliver a time capsule. These students are in line to march with the graduating class of 2013, the first to have spent all four years at WHS.
The first day of classes is Sept. 2. Tile-setters, painters and electricians are putting the finishing touches on the $50 million school and its 42 classrooms.
Principal Rich Manley estimates construction at 95 percent complete. It is slated for 100 percent completion by June 15.
Getting the school built has been a long haul. Along the way, fierce debate raged over its location, the emergency road access, giving students laptop computers and the school colors.
But now many people just look forward to the school as a focal point of the town.
When students enter the building's foyer on the first day of school, they will walk on imported ceramic tiles and find a bright and open space arranged in slanting lines and accented by red geometric shapes.
Light floods the entrance from rows of windows 40 feet above.¬ The view from a second-floor mezzanine looks directly through those windows beyond the 150-acre campus to distant mountains.
"It's my favorite part of the school," Manley said.
Inside the school, anyone with a computer is connected to the world since the entire building is wireless.
And everyone will be equipped with a computer. Each student, teacher, teacher's aide and administrator will receive a laptop computer as part of the school's 1-to-1 laptop program.
Technology and art intersect throughout the building, especially in spaces that support music and drama.
The school, unlike many, has its own dean of fine arts — Karen Sayward — and the music wing includes band, choir and music lab rooms.
The labs are outfitted with nine work stations, including computers and piano keyboards. Students will learn to compose on the keyboards and use recording equipment.
Students are slated to perform three dramatic productions, including a musical and Shakespearean drama, each year. Off the band room is a makeup room with a wall-length mirror for performers to apply makeup.
"They are going to love this," Manley said.
Sayward will run the choir, and teach guitar, piano and singing. Jared Cassedy will teach band, jazz, world drumming and other classes.
The entire community is likely to enjoy the auditorium and its 94-foot-long stage. Custom-designed acoustic panels seal in the sound from above and to the sides. The room seats 602 in comfortable, cushioned seats.
"Any seat is probably a wonderful seat," Sayward said.
Under the back of the auditorium is a hub of sorts with controlled access. The room within a room houses the entire school's automated lighting, heating, security systems, said Glenn Davis, the owner's representative. The owner is the School District.
Davis said the campus off London Bridge Road has been likened by many people to a college campus. A 1-mile serpentine road wends its way past fields and woods to the school.
At the school on Wednesday, ceramic tile installers Greg Anagnos, 31, of Epsom and Stephen Crooker, 29, of Derry said the school has distinction.
They have worked on lots of new school construction projects and said this building stands out from a design perspective and quality of materials.
"The overall design — there's angles everywhere," Crooker said. "A lot of color."¬
The school will open with freshmen and sophomore classes with a total of about 330 students — a student-teacher ratio of 11-1.
The three Windham Middle School students have their own favorite parts of the building, but all like its look and feel.
"We all really like the architecture," Meagan said. "It has a modern feel."
The time capsule the students delivered will remain unopened until a decade after they graduate.
They will open it at their 10-year high school graduation.
ÔÇæÔÇæÔÇæ
Join the discussion. To comment on stories and see what others are saying, log on to eagletribune.com.
