Dunwoody High School

Minutes for School Council Mee7ng with Perkins & Will April 28, 2021 at 2:30 p.m. (via MicrosoJ Teams)

AMendees: Priscilla Cole, Allegra Johnson, John Nash, Dave Levy, Bob Fiscella, Ka;e Scharf, Fran Hughes, Steven Brown (Perkins & Will), Barbara Crum (Perkins & Will), Jared Serwer (Perkins & Will)

1.	Welcome & Mee7ng called to order by David Levy @ 2:38pm

2.	Minutes of last mee7ng were approved unanimously - mo7on to approve called by Allegra Johnson & seconded by John Nash

3.	New Business/Unﬁnished Business

•	Steven Brown - Perkins & Will has two diﬀerent assessment teams and the CMP process will go through November. We will go through the two assessments (Facility Condi;on Assessment & the Educa;onal Sustainability Assessment). In about a month, Perkins & Will will present op;ons for DHS moving forward

•	FCA = 95.94% (out of a 0-100%), this is an average ra;ng looking at the condi;on of the exis;ng facili;es

•	ESA = 68.7% (out of 0-100%), this is a low ra;ng looking at how the school is is suitable for the educa;onal environment.

•	These assessments do not compare facili;es to other facili;es in the county. The facili;es do not include modulars when evalua;ng student popula;on to building capacity. Our Student Popula;on used for the assessment is 1500, even though we are at a popula;on of 2200 (150% capacity. Capacity issues are being addressed in a diﬀerent survey and DHS rates at the top for need for u;liza;on.

•	Perkins & Will will reevaluate several items on the ESA Survey -

i.	12-Non-instruc;onal Space : DHS has had to convert a classroom for a second conference room and the assessment was held on a day that minimal staﬀ was present and no students were present.

ii.	13-Outside Spaces : condi;on of the all of the ﬁelds needs to reevaluated on FCA Survey, no bathrooms available, failure of the socball wall and the lack of ligh;ng needs to be addressed on the FCA survey, the reason there is a wall that is falling down in the oudield is because the socball ﬁeld is too small, new track is only 6 lanes and not 8 lanes.

iii. 14-Safety & Security : needs to be reevaluated and the interior transparency was explained and staﬀ felt that many hallways and classrooms do not allow for transparency because of the use of every possible square inch of the school. The ﬂow of

Dunwoody High School 5035 Vermack Road Dunwoody, Georgia 30338
hjp://www.dunwoodyhs.dekalb.k12.ga.us/ Main Oﬃce: (678) 874-8502 Priscilla Cole, Principal

the facili;es was evaluated with a student popula;on of 1500, and the current popula;on of 2200 makes is NOT work.

iv.     15-Technology Readiness : needs to be reevaluated because the the bandwidth is not adequate for the school. Many areas of the buildings have no internet access and boosters do not work, hot spots are placed to try to help staﬀ and students to connect.

v.	16-Environmental Quality : HVAC concerns need to be reevaluated on FCA survey, staﬀ have the ability to change the thermostat but not the ability to turn the systems on/oﬀ.

vi. 19-Special Educa;on : there is no designated space for paras to work one on one with students inside the ID classrooms. There is a speciﬁc size of space used to designate special ed space and the current facili;es do not meet this size.

vii. 21-CTE & CCL : every pathway should have a minimum of 1 separate oﬃce space, separate lab space, a merchandise store, and classrooms should be sized larger than typically classrooms. DHS does not meet these minimums for the current pathways oﬀered. There is no ﬂexibility of space and the school has “made it work”.

viii. 22-Fine Arts & Crea;ve Learning : DHS does not have a designated dance space, band room is too small, several rooms are used for mul;ple ac;vi;es (dance & wrestling, band & Chorus & Orchestra). There is no black box theater for student use. Auditorium should not be rated as the theater classroom, there is no classroom for theater - needs to be reevaluated. Perkins & Will need to change the language int he survey from Theater to Auditorium. If rooms are being used by mul;ple groups, the ra;ng needs to be lowered.

ix. 23-Athle;cs & Wellness : DHS needs an Auxiliary Gym, there is not enough space. The ﬁelds outside are rated too high since the facili;es do not have bathrooms , there are not enough bleachers and they are not ADA compliant. If sports are grouped together as the en;re spaces needed, then ra;ng should be lower. No sports have access to func;oning locker rooms, lack of oﬃce space for coaches and the teams are just “making it work”. Add to the FCA report - the baseball baqng cage and building are falling down. If we are looking truly at current status of ﬁelds, football/soccer/track should be a 1 because there are no func;onal ﬁelds. Track and ﬁeld needs to be lowered because there is no “ﬁeld” equipment (shot put, discus, etc…). The pole vault equipment is not func;onal. Lacrosse is not even included in the survey. One ﬁeld is being used for 8 sports. Perkins & Will rerated wres;ng to a 1. Final point of looking at alignment of ﬁelds to Campus Improvements being rated a 5 of 5 needs to be reevaluated. DHS is the only 7A school in Dekalb County and has ﬁeld and athle;c spaces and ﬁelds of signiﬁcantly smaller schools. Weight-room ﬂoor is cracked and concrete will fall through the ceiling in the gym lobby.

x.	24-FoodServices : DHS has 5 lunches with equipment that is extremely old.

•	Perkins & Will will reevaluate several items on the FCA Survey -

xi. Whole school needs a new roof, locker rooms are non-func;onal, HVAC needs to be replaced, ﬁre alarm needs to be replaced. The school is in need of many various repairs.

Dunwoody High School 5035 Vermack Road Dunwoody, Georgia 30338
hjp://www.dunwoodyhs.dekalb.k12.ga.us/ Main Oﬃce: (678) 874-8502 Priscilla Cole, Principal

xii. Lightning Protec;on System needs to be working for the whole school and there is uncertainty on whether it is func;onal.

xiii. Deten;on Pond must be removed due to the fact that it does not work correctly and there has been plans to replace it with a parking lot in place with the county. It is a health hazard & ﬁlled with mosquitos because it does not drain properly.

Principal Cole expressed her concern that the “repairs” she and her staﬀ have done through the facility on their own will be seen as ﬁxed and will not be addressed. She also wanted Perkins & Will to understand that the energy of the council and staﬀ is from the heart and concern over our school.

Steven (Perkins & Will) assured the council their survey will not count the crea;ve use of closets as oﬃces in the ﬁnal report.

Bob Fiscella expressed his frustra;on over the amount of incorrect ra;ngs and informa;on in these surveys.

4.	Wrap-up by Steven at Perkins & Will

·	All of this informa;on will be sent to Jacobs for review

·	The ﬁnal CMP will be ﬁnalized in November

·	The next steps will include more site visits, council members asked for staﬀ to be present in order to see the actual use of facili;es, also requested council members and Principal Cole be present for the reassessment tour.

·	Solu;on op;ons will be presented in about a month

·	Website to see up to date surveys -

www.DekalbSchoolsgs.org/comprehensive-master-plan/data-dashboard

5.	Mee7ng adjourned unanimously - mo7on called by Allegra Johnson and seconded by John Nash at 4:30pm

Dunwoody High School 5035 Vermack Road Dunwoody, Georgia 30338
hjp://www.dunwoodyhs.dekalb.k12.ga.us/ Main Oﬃce: (678) 874-8502 Priscilla Cole, Principal