Komarek School District 94 has provided educational needs to the Pre-K through 8th grades for over 75 years. The existing facility consisted of two structures with a connecting bridge spanning over 13th avenue. As the district investigated the needs of the building, the challenge became how to balance maintenance needs of the facility with curricular needs. The district elected to conduct a Master Plan to project out twenty years an beyond. A number of community hearings occurred over the course of two years to get feedback and help plan for the future of the District. These hearings consisted of multiple user groups, from students, teachers, families, senior citizens and general homeowners.
From those meetings, multiple design options were developed to address all the needs at various levels of success. The community wanted to solve as many issues as possible while still being fiscally responsible to the homeowners. The created design options and their associated budgets were tested with the community until a final solution was established. At the end of 2019, a formal request for referendum was voted on by the school board. In March of 2020, the community voted in approval of the referendum and the overall Master Plan design.
The major goal of the Master Plan was to minimize circulation, create a safe and secure entry, and unify the two buildings into one as best as possible. The new addition to the west building brought all core classrooms under one roof, created a secure pre-school, established an identity with one main entrance, and re-zoned all grade levels. Working with the Village, the center street was vacated and turned into a play space that allowed for better supervision and security. On the east end of the site, a majority of the existing building was removed and a new competitive gymnasium constructed to easily separate night events from the existing building; allow for community use; and remedy parking congestion by pulling it off the street and onto the site.
