Representatives from the district's architectural team and facilities staff presented an update on the Wold-led media-center renovation project at the July 16 board meeting, showing settled floor plans, summarizing student feedback exercises, and outlining next steps toward bidding and award.

The design team reviewed how floor plans were adjusted to reflect user-group input: for younger-grade buildings the large-group area and makerspace will be separated by an operable wall so spaces can combine for larger gatherings; for older students the operable wall will be placed between makerspace and STEM areas to support shared curriculum and larger group work. The team said sight lines for media-center specialists were moved to improve visibility of stacks, makerspaces and small-group areas.

Design process and student input: The architects said they ran two student workshops with older students (a middle-school group and a Park campus group), where students selected imagery and word-cloud themes. "Nature, outdoors, earthy" appeared as a common theme, the presentation showed, and the design team plans to translate that into distinct building identities (for example, forest, desert, oceanic themes) and finishes.

Budget and schedule: The architect noted the project remains "right on track" with the estimator's first cost and that alternates will be included on bid day to preserve flexibility. The team said they expect to finalize furniture vendor selection this month, form a design committee with 2 3 staff members from each building to select finishes, and return to the board for a bid-award recommendation in November. Facilities staff also said media-center construction in some buildings is planned for 2026 and that summer mechanical work (boilers and chillers) at other sites is near completion.

Why it matters: Media-center renovations were included in the district referendum materials and are intended to update instructional spaces, expand makerspaces and STEM adjacencies, and create consistent, modern learning environments across elementary and middle-grade campuses.

Next steps: District staff will convene the design committee, complete technology and furniture selections, refine alternates, finalize a final estimate and request bids, then return to the board with an award recommendation in November.

No formal board action was recorded on the media-center presentation at the July 16 meeting; staff requested questions and will report back in the coming months.