When Upper School students return from their summer break in September, they will find their school building looking different than how they left it. 

It has recently been announced that construction of the Annette M. & Theodore N. Lerner Family Upper School Campus will take place over the summer of 2016. The estimated cost is between $800,000 and $1 million, which will be funded with money from the school reserves and a grant the school received from an anonymous donor. To learn more about the specifics of the changes, check out the descriptions below and scroll over the image tags.  

Middle school classrooms will be in the 100’s while high school classrooms will be in the 200’s and 300’s.

The 100’s classrooms will be specifically designated for the middle school. Head of School Rabbi Mitchel Malkus believes that since the middle-schoolers and high-schoolers are at different stages developmentally, it is beneficial to provide them each with their own separate spaces.

“I want the middle-schoolers to feel really comfortable and have their own area,” Malkus said. “I also want the high-schoolers to feel like they have their own space and that it is separate from the middle school.”

The 200’s and 300’s classrooms will only be for high-schoolers. High-schoolers will have minimal interaction with middle-schoolers, as they will not share any classrooms or be on the same side of the building during the school day.

Front offices will expand into the atrium.

The Upper School admissions team’s offices will be redesigned to become storage space for the science department. Consequently, there will be room made for them by expanding the front offices into the atrium.

The teacher’s lounge and Upper School admissions team’s offices will be replaced by a storage closet for the Science department.

Because this location is close to the Science department and the new Innovations Center for Robotics and Design, it will be used as a science storage closet.

Central rooms in the 100’s will be replaced with middle school administrator offices.

The classroom in the center of the 100’s will become the offices for all Middle School administrators, including guidance counselors. Because the sixth grade will be added to the middle school, more administrators are needed. JDS will hire an additional middle school guidance counselor and an assistant principal to help current Middle School Principal Rebecca Weisman.

Guidance will be replaced with the Innovations Center for Robotics and Design.

The Innovations Center for Robotics and Design is part of a plan to integrate science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) into the middle school curriculum as a continuation of the STEM education students received at the Lower School. After a few years, the hope is that the STEM program will carry over to the high school curriculum as well. The STEM lab will be a place for students to experiment with devices such as 3-D printers and Google Cardboard —  a virtual reality device that will allow students to view 360-degree videos.

College and high school guidance offices will be relocated.

College and high school guidance counselors will be moved to the technology lab’s current location.

Below is a current map of the school. In order to see what will be changing next year, scroll over the tags on the photo.