I’m pretty sure we all saw this coming–the end of Brokaw and the start of renovation. Brokaw Hall has been around since the start of Trinity Prep in 1968. On Tuesday, July 15, we said goodbye to the heart of the middle school and hello to the new beginning of a bigger building.
The new building will have a black-box theater that will serve as a performance space, meeting space and practice area. Many plays and performances take place during the year, whether it’s a middle school performance or a high school one, and it will be helpful to have extra space for preparation of the event.
There will also be an outside patio area for eating and relaxation for the students and faculty. The Grille frequently fills up with students during lunch; therefore, having an extra area for eating will come in handy. Both the black-box theater and the patio will add more room on the campus for student and teacher needs.
“I think it’s going to be a good accessory to Trinity’s campus because of the black box,” freshman Olivia Wynn said. “It would be good for the theater department.”
The new school building will definitely come to use in the long run. It’s time for us to take a step forward in striving to be a better school. Brokaw Hall was an old building and, although special middle school memories were made, it’s time for a new building to take its place.
A lot is happening on the campus, including some inconveniences. The middle school students have classes in Customized Temporary Classrooms (CTCs), which are far away from rest of the school life such as the Grille and the auditorium.
The reconstruction is also affecting teachers and students in the upper school. At one point this semester, all of the classes in the arts building had to be moved due to construction. This was a problem for classes such as art, newspaper and yearbook because they didn’t have the proper resources and supplies in the temporary classrooms. Also, shadowing students and visiting families might see the school as a construction site.
These changes around the campus have their flaws, but it will be overall beneficial for the growth of our school.
Some important additions to the new building are bigger classrooms and bathrooms. The former girls’ bathroom in Brokaw Hall wasn’t wheelchair accessible, but the new building will have that important update.
The bigger classrooms in the new building will be available for a better learning environment for the students. Some of the classrooms might be used as a science lab for big science experiments or for a class that demands a lot of work space.
There will be many new and improved features in the middle school building, which is definitely needed for the progression of the school. More students will be joining the middle school as the years go on and bigger classrooms will be necessary.
“My thoughts about Trinity have changed a little bit, because I wasn’t expecting portables, “7th grader Abby Freedman said. “Now that I am having classes in them I think that they are just as good as regular classrooms. Once you are inside you can’t really tell that you are in a portable.”
The main reason we are renovating the middle school is to continue and advance the school’s future in the years to come. The plan of having CTCs and adding a brand new middle school will be a helpful and necessary change to the school campus that we should all look forward to.
