Recent construction at the Cañon City schools has led to major improvements for the students and staff.
Before renovations started on the Cañon City Middle School, all of the heavy equipment for grounds maintenance was stored in a small shed behind CCMS’s band room. This space was compact and didn’t have proper ventilation. The old tool shed soon will be deconstructed and become part of the CCMS grass field. The new equipment shed has been constructed and is now in use.
This new operations office is located west of the Cañon City High School. District officials said this is a more convenient location for the heavy groundskeeping equipment for the schools. This equipment shed is now closer to both of the largest fields that the school district’s operations office has to maintain.
This larger operations facility can hold all the large pieces of equipment and tools for grounds maintenance. Along with the new space and proper ventilation, the current operations building has a functioning office.
“For the first time in 40 years, we have drinking water in the building we work out of,” district operations groundskeeper Joe Fackrell said.
The newly constructed operations office also shares the building with the relocated computer recycling lab, which used to be housed in CCHS. Because of this dedicated space for computer recycling, CCHS has started a new class for their students. In this course, students will be able to learn how to fix and rebuild computers, computer business skills, and customer service abilities. Once this new course is completed, students will earn an A+ Certification, a nationally recognized certification creates job opportunities right out of high school.
Along with the real-life application and job opportunities, this class offers to students, these high schoolers will also learn how to fix the student’s Chromebooks so that they will no longer have to be sent out for repairs.
A donation of new computers to this class was made by Lindner Chevrolet. These new computers will aid students in learning how to rebuild computers using state of the art technology from Lindner’s donation.
The old computer recycling area in CCHS will be converted into an Advanced Manufacturing Lab, where students who have learned CTE skills, such as woodworking and welding, can combine those abilities and create advanced pieces of technology, such as go-karts, drones, and rockets. This new lab will have a 3D printer, sheet metal station and a pipe bending station. Students who build rockets will have the rockets transported to White Sands, N.M., so they can be launched in a secured area and shot down if needed.
Officials said the changes and opportunities happening within the school district because of the new construction is incredible. Renovations within the school district are incomplete yet the recent construction has already changed hundreds of student’s lives by offering more job opportunities and lifelong skills.
