Saugus school board eager to apply for new high school

SAUGUS – School Committee Chairman Wendy Reed said the Massachusetts School Building Authority announced it will open applications for statements of interest for new schools in January.At a rare Thursday morning School Committee meeting, Reed said the committee is “prepared to move forward” with an application for a new high school and noted it could take up to a year to find out results.?If it opens in January we can start inputting the data,” said Reed. “The closing will be sometime in the spring, probably March, so we?ll have time to pull that together and submit it on time. I think we?re pretty much all lined up and prepared.”In other business, Finance Director Pola Andrews said a request for proposal for a new school master plan cannot be submitted because town policy is to not put out a request without funds available.Andrews said a new feasibility study, which would be an update of a 2002 study, could cost between $80,000 and $140,000. The only other option would be to get verbal quotes from architecture firms.Grabowski said Andrews should try to get quotes by the next annual Town Meeting.?Ten years is a long time to not have a plan and the schools haven?t gotten any better since then,” he said. “We need a capital plan for the schools for the town?s sake.”At the request of Andrews, the committee also voted unanimously to establish a new revolving account for the high school guidance department.Andrews said the primary source or revenue would be PSAT, prep course fees and fees toward promoting secondary educations.?Any funds that would be leftover from these activities could be used to promote post secondary activities such as visits to colleges and college fairs,” said Andrews. “Currently the funds have been going into the student activity funds at the high school. That?s not best practice. They should be segregated.”Matt Tempesta can be reached at [email protected].