PEABODY — While renovations to the Welch School won’t be completed until November, officials — and students — were welcomed into the school to get a look at the completion of the first phase of construction on Monday, which encompassed the reconstruction of classrooms at the front of the building.
Mayor Edward A. Bettencourt Jr., Superintendent of Schools Josh Vadala, and School Committee member Beverley Griffin Dunne, who chairs the Welch School Building Committee, were on-hand to tour the newly-renovated building at the close of the first of four phases of construction. The project is set to cost the city in excess of $30 million, with the Massachusetts School Building Authority reimbursing construction costs up to 66 percent, according to Dunne.
Students in pre-K through third grade remained in the building while construction was underway, while older students — those in fourth and fifth grade — were moved out to other schools in the city. The school’s youngest students — in pre-K, kindergarten, and first grade — had their first day in the new classrooms Monday morning.
Work on the second phase of the construction project — encompassing the back of the building — is already underway, Dunne said.
“It’s been a really amazing project,” said Dunne. “They went right to it, they worked all week during vacation.”
The district submitted a statement of interest for the Welch School with the MSBA under their Accelerated Repair program, which encompasses “repair and/or replacement of roofs, windows/doors, and/or boilers,” only for the agency to determine the extent of the work necessary at the school necessitated it be moved to its core program. The core program covers more extensive renovations, essentially allowing the reconstruction of the school from the ground up.
That shift came as the result of an attempt to better address 21st-century educational needs, Dunne said.
She said by the time the project is finished, the only original elements remaining will be the cinderblocks. Over the course of the project, Dunne and other stakeholders met with Dore and Whittier, the owner’s project manager, on a weekly basis to get updates on the construction’s progress.
On the Monday morning tour, the new areas of the school stood in stark contrast to the remaining areas from the original school, which Dunne said was constructed in 1973. In the newly-renovated spaces, green and blue painted walls gleamed with sunlight that poured in from newly-placed windows, while older areas featured clearly aging brick walls and little light. One of the starkest visible contrasts was that of the windows, with the old windows almost impossible to see out of.
“It’s nice to see out the windows,” quipped Bettencourt.
Project Manager Christine Dell Angelo, of Dore and Whittier, said construction on the new school began in June of 2022, and is set to be completed this November when the gym comes online. All of the school’s new classrooms should come online before the start of the 2023-24 school year, she said.
Dell Angelo praised Principal Michelle Massa and her team for staying flexible while the construction took place during the school year. Massa and other school officials “utilized every space” in the existing building, she said.
“It’s very difficult to be under a fully occupied renovation of an existing building,” Dell Angelo said. “Honestly you guys were incredible to work with.”
“It’s just incredible to see how they came back from April vacation and didn’t skip a beat,” she added.
Throughout the tour, Bettencourt repeatedly emphasized what he saw as the importance of the project, given the immense costs of constructing new school buildings.
“We built a brand new middle school a few years ago, which has been a wonderful addition to our city, but financially, we’re not able to build brand new schools so we have to look for opportunities to do renovations, to do significant improvements for buildings, to extend the life cycles of those buildings,” he said. “As we plan ahead and budget ahead for the school projects, there’s opportunities to really do some major work.”
Bettencourt said he is a staunch supporter of local, neighborhood elementary schools, and has no plans for Peabody to follow neighboring communities in condensing its early education into one or two buildings. Smaller schools enable residents to really get to know their neighbors and build community bonds, he said.
The new building will aid in that goal, serving as a community center for the neighborhood in a new way. Bettencourt said the Welch will now provide year-round educational opportunities for Peabody students and families.
Dunne said it was difficult to put the feeling of seeing the new school building into words.
“It’s more than I ever dreamed of,” she said. “It’s just absolutely beautiful.”
