MARYSVILLE — Attendees of all ages were well aware of the significance of the Feb. 3 steel topping-off ceremony at the site of the new Marysville-Getchell High School.
Marysville School District staff, community members and construction workers were joined by 18 students, currently enrolled in the Small Learning Communities of Marysville-Pilchuck High School, in witnessing the installation of the final steel beam in the first of Marysville-Getchell High School’s five buildings.
The 2,400-pound horizontal beam will be part of a classroom ceiling, but it wasn’t hoisted into place by a crane until the 18 future students of Marysville-Getchell High School in attendance all got to sign it.
“Just a bit over 30 years ago, I stood in the same place that you guys are standing now,” Marysville School District Board of Directors member Michael Kundu said to the students at the site. “This was about 2,500 miles away from here, but I stood there as they built our first high school and I was one of the first students to walk down its halls. At the time, it wasn’t that big a deal, just a chance for me to get out of school. I thought it was kind of neat, but it never really occurred to me what it meant until years later. So, while you might think it’s kind of neat now, I guarantee you, 30 years from now, you’ll be able to think back to all the wonderful memories you made during your time here.”
Marysville-Pilchuck High School teachers selected the 18 students based on their potential to lead their classmates through the transition into Marysville-Getchell High School, and if the individual students interviewed by The Marysville Globe are any indicator, these students as a whole are conscious of this responsibility.
John Williams, a freshman in the Bio-Med Academy, expressed excitement and “a lot of gratitude” at being able to take part in the ceremony. He looks forward to being among the first of his classmates to walk the hallways of their new school, as well as to “seeing that we were a part of this, and will remain a part of it.”
Louie Vital, a freshman in the School for the Entrepreneur, wrote her own name and the names of several friends whom she anticipates she’ll be leaving behind at Marysville-Pilchuck High School, and was quick to point out that not many students received the opportunity to attend the ceremony or sign the beam.
“I’m so pumped!” Vital said. “I’m so excited to be here. I’m going to be here. This is my future high school. I can’t wait to go here. I’m going to bring back my old friends and say, ‘Look, this is what I wrote. It’s my name.’ I’m a part of this school.”
“It was an amazing idea to have us sign the beam, so that they’ll know part of the representation from the original M-P, and how the SLCs were before this,” said Elizabeth Lefstad, a sophomore in the International School of Communications, after Vital had written “Entrepreneurs!” on the beam. “The new training room for sports medicine is going to be really nice. Also, just being in our own building is going to be really amazing.”
Tracy Suchan Toothaker, principal of Marysville-Pilchuck High School and planning principal for Marysville-Getchell High School, joined Marysville School District Superintendent Dr. Larry Nyland in noting that the new school is currently set to open within budget, and possibly ahead of schedule by as much as a year, in 2010 rather than 2011. The state is expected to pay for $16.8 million of the $96 million new school, while a voter-approved bond is slated to cover the rest.
Construction on Marysville-Getchell High School continues even as the Marysville School District Board of Directors weighs the options of closing one or more elementary schools, due to falling enrollment numbers and shrinking budgets. The bond for the new school was approved by voters in 2006, back when projected enrollment numbers were still rising. Since then, steel beams and concrete walls have gone up, while the ground floor has been poured.
Although previous plans would have placed the signed beam behind ceiling tiles, architects have since started to consider some means of highlighting the beam and its signatures.
