March 28, 2024

Seekonk’s Aitken Elementary School Renovation Near Completion

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Work on the $10.5 million addition for the Aitken Elementary School is set to be completed soon. There will be 10 new classrooms to accommodate a growing school population. Modular units were used for Aitken and Martin schools to help deal with the overcrowding. $1.5 million was spent to install air conditioning throughout the school. There is also a new boiler and ventilation system. Voters approved a temporary tax increase in June 2019 to pay for the construction.

Jill Brilhante, the district’s school business administrator, told the school committee Monday the modular will be removed by April 21. “As soon as we received the certificate of occupancy for the new Aitken wing, principal (John) Haidemenos moved the classes that were in the modular unit into the new wing - this needed to be done since we were bringing all of our students back in order to keep with proper distancing,” explained School Superintendent Rich Drolet.

“Once this school year ends, we will have a ceremony to celebrate and show off the new Aitken addition in June,” Drolet continued. “The Aitken Building Committee has done a commendable job working with the contractors to ensure this project has stayed on time and under budget. Yes, the Aitken modular unit should be removed next week over April vacation.” 

Drolet announced after adding all sophomores and juniors in Grades 10 and 11, Monday was the first day all students were back in school five days a week. “I would like to thank everyone who has worked so hard over the past year, overcoming so many obstacles and challenges, to finally make our full return to school a reality,” Drolet added. “Knowing our Covid numbers have crept back up in the past few weeks, more students or classes may be required to quarantine and/or temporarily return to full remote learning. Additionally, the possibility remains that a grade level or school may need to shift to full remote learning if we encounter too many close contacts. We continue to meet weekly with Seekonk’s Board of Health Agent and CTC representative in order to cross-reference any positive cases as well as confirm close contacts associated with our outside-of-school as well as in-school confirmed positive cases. Thankfully, most of our teachers and staff are now fully vaccinated.” 

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