CHESAPEAKE – Architects with Tanner-Stone & Company met with Chesapeake school board members and the public to discuss plans for that district’s new elementary school.

Monday, January 14, 2002

CHESAPEAKE – Architects with Tanner-Stone & Company met with Chesapeake school board members and the public to discuss plans for that district’s new elementary school. Architects with the firm showed the group a conceptual drawing of the proposed elementary at the board’s last meeting.

The drawings and the scale model of the school represented about 30 percent of the design work, architect Mark Tanner told the group.

The plans for the building, Tanner explained, was based upon the conditions of the relatively small construction site.

Tanner called the plans for the building "unique" citing the firm has never built a school exactly like the one he proposed. The two story building, Tanner explained, will be based on a semi-circle design, with square pods branching off of the semi-circle. The design of the building will allow educators the ability to segregate classes, keeping the same grades together, putting distance between the older children and the younger students.

The building will also house a courtyard in the center between the academic pods and the general use pods that will house the gymnasium, cafeteria, kitchen and music room. The administration wing of the building, Tanner explained, is designed so the school principal can observe both the bus parking lot and regular traffic parking lot which will is kept seperate. The building is also designed so that people entering the school must pass by the principal’s office, allowing administrators control over who enters the building.

Tanner said the firm is working up some preliminart cost analysis, while fine tuning the design and working out the flaws.

Superintendent Fred Wood, Jr. said the district would like to break ground on the construction by this fall.