District 113 Study Groups Tour Other Districts' High Schools

Community volunteers who serve on the study group committees for District 113 will participate in building tours on multiple dates in order to get a first-hand look at the facilities of other schools in the Chicago area.

On Wednesday, October 12, members of the Teaching and Learning study group will tour Lake Forest High School to see their renovated library and the utilization of technology in their classroom spaces.

On Saturday, October 15, members of every study group are invited to visit both York and Naperville High Schools. These facilities are comparable because they recently completed work to update classroom and physical education spaces that were outdated and dysfunctional. District 113 architectural firm Wight & Company oversaw the work on these two schools.

A third tour will take place on Wednesday, November 30. The study groups will tour Glenbrook North and Lake Forest High Schools. The tour will cover classrooms, team-teaching classrooms, the library, the cafeteria, commons areas, the main gym, the pool, the physical education resource room, computer labs, the dance studio and multimedia centers.

Committee members continue to attend meetings pertaining to their area of study in a collaborative effort to recommend future long-range facility and technology plans. Many hours of volunteer time have already been invested to carefully analyze issues pertaining to facility and technology renovations. Through active study and ongoing dialogue, the community, administration and the District 113 Board of Education are refining the long-range facility and technology plan.

The community members on committees will see other high school facilities in order to effectively develop their recommendations. These members are voluntarily committing to a dynamic process of study, analysis and dialogue. They are investing a great deal of time in order to offer their best recommendations to the Leadership Team, who will in turn make recommendations to the Board of Education of District 113.

Over 130 members are currently serving on the six study group committees. The vast majority of these participants are volunteers from the community. The study groups that are active are market research, leadership team, teaching and learning, PE/athletics/pool, finance, and building systems. Details regarding the work of these groups are available on the District 113 Web site. A meeting calendar, meeting notes and committee membership rosters are readily available at http://www.dist113.org/Pages/Default.aspx

Click on the story under District News entitled “District 113 Forms Leadership Team and Study Groups” to learn more about their work.