Pleasant Valley equipment, furniture on the move
Groton — In closing Pleasant Valley Elementary School, the school district’s first priority was relocating displaced students. Now, it’s focusing on what to do with various items at the shuttered school.
This means moving a portable classroom building, a trailer, air conditioners, library shelves and furniture to other schools, where they are needed.
“While closing Pleasant Valley School was not a pleasant thing to do, there actually are some good things to come from it,” said Samuel Kilpatrick, director of buildings and grounds for Groton Public Schools.
Parents were notified in April that Pleasant Valley would be closing because the district could not afford to
keep it open. Its students have been placed elsewhere in the district, with the largest share going to Charles Barnum Elementary.
Kilpatrick said that while nobody wanted Pleasant Valley to be closed, he is “using a lot of the systems in the school to upgrade other places” in the district.
One example: Air conditioners have been moved to the Cutler Middle School cafeteria, one of the only facilities in the district that lacked air conditioning.
Kilpatrick also is working to get approvals from town officials to move a trailer to Mary Morrisson Elementary and one of the two portable classroom buildings to Charles Barnum Elementary; the other will remain in place for the time being.
Each portable building and trailer contains two classrooms, and Kilpatrick hopes to have them moved by the end of July. The trailer is 12 by 62 feet, while each portable building is 24 by 65, he said. He said the portable classrooms were moved from West Side Middle School to Pleasant Valley 15 or 20 years ago.
Superintendent Michael Graner said the two classrooms in the portable building are bolted together, but they will be separated for moving purposes and then put back together at Charles Barnum.
“We're getting two full classrooms, which we desperately need,” Graner said.
Groton Board of Education member Rita Volkmann expressed concern about the noise level in the portable structures. Graner told The Day that some sound-deadening material could be added when the classrooms are put back together.
Assistant Superintendent Susan Austin added that playground equipment at Pleasant Valley will be moved to Claude Chester Elementary School. This is in conjunction with two preschool classes being moved from Charles Barnum to Claude Chester, so Charles Barnum can have room for the new students coming from Pleasant Valley.
A lot of furniture will be going to additional fourth- and fifth-grade classes at Charles Barnum, while some will be going to S.B. Butler Elementary. Kilpatrick noted that Pleasant Valley teachers being relocated were told to tag items they wanted to be moved with them. Library shelves from Pleasant Valley will replace aging ones at Mary Morrisson, he said.
The earliest he expects to have everything moved out of the shuttered school is late fall.