Most students are thrilled to get new shoes, clothes, and school supplies with the start of the school year. Mancos students have a whole new campus. Well, almost. Sponsored by Cortez Airport and Whole Health Family Medicine Clinic
Out with the old? Never. But add something new? You bet. Students in the Mancos School District returned for classes this summer to $25 million in renovations and additions to their campus all while keeping the 100 year-old high school building intact. You're watching the local news network brought to you by the Cortez Airport and Whole Health Family Medicine. I'm Wendy Graham Settle. The old Mancos High School built in 1909 remains a central fixture on the Mancos School District campus in the middle of this small town, and it remains as the oldest continuously occupied high school in the state of Colorado. While the outside looks like the historic structure that it is, the inside and the surrounding buildings are updated, renovated and expanded as part of a $25 million construction project that was actually completed last year. But it wasn't until the start of this school year that the renovations were dedicated and the Masonic cornerstone was laid into place at the performing arts center. Mancos School District voters approved a mill levy increase in 2017 to generate about $5 million in revenues. It also served as a match for a $19.7 million best grant from the Colorado Department of Education. Students now have a cafeteria that no longer has to double as a gym. The old barrel-roof gym has been completely refurbished with a performing arts stage added to the south end. Carpentry and welding workshops have been expanded and are safer, and students have weight rooms and refurbished locker rooms. The football stadium has new seating. The field's state-of-the-art artificial turf and a new track. New safety features can be found throughout the campus with surveillance cameras, new electronic entrance locks, and a campus-wide automatic lockdown system for classroom doors. What was old has come back to life with the makeover.
It's been a good positive environment. It's nice to have things upgraded, whether it's from technology to computers, but just having more room, and be able to have a cafeteria be a cafeteria, and have that design to be where it's a little more free, and the feeling is, it's just very, been received well.
Learn more about the construction project at the district's website at mancosre6.edu Thanks for watching this edition of the Local News Network. I'm Wendy Graham Settle.
