Architect rendering of the new wing under construction at Rhodes School in River Grove. (Courtesy of Wight & Company, of Chicago) - Original Credit: (Wight Co. / HANDOUT)

Officials broke ground in May on a $14 million construction project that will add classrooms and a new courtyard at Rhodes School in River Grove.

The work follows 2014 and 2018 renovations as well as the construction of a new bus garage, each of which cost about $3 million, according to School District 84.5.

The new wing encompasses 21,000 square feet and adds an early education library, a 1,400-square-foot multi-purpose area, seven breakout rooms, two large restrooms and eight new classrooms --each with its own small bathroom and storage closet.

Located between the new construction and the rest of the school building will be a 6,100-square-foot courtyard featuring two outdoor classroom spaces and other play and learning areas.

Architect rendering of the interior of a new classroom to be built at Rhodes School. (Courtesy of Wight & Company, of Chicago) - Original Credit: (Wight Co. / HANDOUT)

School Superintendent Jim Prather said the project is being financed without asking taxpayers for referendum funding.

“We never even considered that,” Prather said. “The district’s financial health is very good. Our fund balance is currently at just over $27 million.”

In addition to some state funding, Prather said the district is using about $1 million in federal money received from the American Rescue Plan toward the cost of the new construction.

Originally built in 1948, Rhodes School has an enrollment of about 550 pre-kindergarten through grade eight students from River Grove and Melrose Park. It employs roughly 70 teachers, Prather said.

“We have four sections of eighth graders,” he said. “Each class is over 20 students, but class sizes are between 10 and 20 in all the others.”

The new classrooms will be devoted to kindergarten and first grade, although the exact configuration has not yet been determined.

Architect rendering of the new Early Education Library to be built at Rhodes School. (Courtesy of Wight & Company, of Chicago) - Original Credit: (Wight Co. / HANDOUT)

In addition to traditional speeches and the shoveling of dirt, the groundbreaking ceremony in May featured a teachers versus 8th grade softball game, a photo booth, food and giveaways.

“It was an extremely good turnout,” Prather said. “The fact is, when you don’t have to go to referendum, then people don’t have the same concerns about their taxes being raised at election time, worries about us asking for more money or that we’re not proceeding prudently.”

Plans for the new project began in March 2020, when the COVID pandemic forced many schools to close temporarily.

“We had conversations with our teachers, who let us know their thoughts about building improvements that would help student learning,” Prather said. “The most common thing we heard was that there were enough regular classrooms, but there were not enough resource rooms.”

As a result, one shared breakout room — a small room for private instruction — has been designed in between each pair of new classrooms.

“The goal is to teach the child in the classroom with their peers,” Prather explained. “But there are times when that’s not realistic. Sometimes a child needs extra instruction or support and it’s a distraction to do that inside the classroom.”

Other design elements of the new classrooms include reading areas, closet spaces for coats, a counter and sink, a small bathroom and a storage room. Windows of the classroom are closer to the ground for the young learners.

“With the lower windows, the kids’ curiosity will be fed by looking out at their level,” Prather said. “That was a design idea from the architects who gave us a great lens of that, literally and figuratively.”

Both the architecture design and the construction are being done by Wight & Company, the Chicago firm that did both previous Rhodes School renovations.

Brad Paulsen is Wight’s PK-12 Education Practice Leader.

“We always try to develop design solutions that respond to the age and scale of the student,” Paulsen said. “We want kids to be excited to go to school and to build those early experiences and the excitement about what learning can be, as opposed to the more traditional 20th Century sterile learning environment that we all grew up with.”

Instead of long, narrow hallways, the new school wing will feature wall segments interspersed with benches and inset places to sit and interact.

School District 84.5 Board of Education members taking part in the groundbreaking ceremony at Rhodes School May 11 included (left to right) Jim DiPaola, Nina White, Jan Roeder, Ben Ramirez, Mike Ashbeck, Gina Leder and Laura Danek. - Original Credit: (Emily Lahti / HANDOUT)

Paulsen described it as “a corridor in which students can participate, engage with each other and have opportunities to learn, as opposed to a traditional school corridor where they’re just moving from point A to point B.”

According to a timeline on the district website, construction is to be completed by August of next year, with commissioning by the following November.