The $20 million building project that is ongoing at St. Mary’s will have a transformative effect.
“We will truly have a campus feel, in the middle of downtown Lynn,” said Associate Head of School David Angeramo of the project that will feature two floors of classroom and lab space in the new STEM building, a three-story, 30,000-square-foot edifice that will sit behind the new gateway entrance to campus.
The goal of the project, Angeramo said, is to “maximize all the space we have,” and St. Mary’s is doing that and then some.
“This is going to change the future of St. Mary’s,” Head of School Dr. John F. Dolan said. “We will no longer be a September-to-May school. This building won’t shut down. It will be a fully functional, state-of-the-art science center that will operate year-round.”
The new entrance will lead to the first floor of the STEM building, which will include the lobby, main office, guidance office and learning commons. From the lobby, the cafeteria and Tony Conigliaro ’62 Gymnasium will be easily accessible. All science and engineering classes will be held on the two upper floors, with cutting-edge equipment and learning spaces for students in grades 6-12.
St. Mary’s students are already exposed to STEM courses, with all seventh-graders taking Design & Modeling, eighth-graders studying Automation & Robotics, and high school freshmen taking Intro to Engineering Design. Beyond that, there are electives, including Advanced Placement offerings in Biology, Chemistry and Computer Science, as well as Intro to Engineering Design 2, Civil Engineering and Architecture.
Phase 1 of the project involved the conversion of the heating system from steam to hot water, necessitating moving the boilers from the boiler plant in the rear parking lot to a newly created boiler room in the second level of the gym. Phase 2 was the demolition of the Chapel and Annex building and the old boiler plant.
The third and final phase consists of the construction of the gateway entrance and STEM building, which started last May and is scheduled to be completed in the summer of 2020.
“This project is a game-changer for St. Mary’s,” said Dolan, who is equally excited about the creation of green space, an outdoor quad with a movie screen, and a grotto dedicated to the Blessed Mother. The grotto will be built on land that sat below the altar in the old chapel that was located in the Annex. “St. Mary’s students will learn today’s skills for tomorrow’s world. It is an exciting time to be a Spartan.”
