District 11 hires geotechnical firm after Jenkins students moved to Russell and Doherty

Superintendent Gong told the Board of Education at a work session that Colorado Springs School District 11 has moved Jenkins Middle School students into other buildings while crews investigate the cause of recent building problems and that the district has contracted a soils firm to help determine next steps.

The superintendent said Jenkins sixth-graders will attend classes at Russell and seventh- and eighth-graders at Doherty, and parents will be offered orientation sessions tomorrow evening from 4:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. followed by school start for Jenkins families on Friday. “We have moved with great urgency to bring CTL Thompson on contract to be able to get that work for us to get that full report to our community,” the superintendent said, referring to a geotechnical survey subcontracted through the district’s Jensen Hughes contract.

The geotechnical work is intended “to understand exactly what has caused this,” the superintendent said, adding that the goal is to identify a root cause — for example, whether the problem is…