Jonathan Alder schools are moving forward with plans for major updates around the district after the bond issue passed in November. The district’s visioning committee is playing a massive role in these changes themselves and how they will support students’ future learning.
This committee was created in order to gather feedback and input from teachers, students, and community members about the future of the district. The district’s assistant superintendent, Carla Quick, says the first round of committees spent time to determine what the students would need most from the upcoming changes in order to make the initial plan for the buildings.
“We had three different groups of people working,” Quick says. “About 40 staff members, around 40 community members, and a group of students from Canaan, the junior high, and the high school. The goal was to figure out the district’s vision for the future of teaching and learning.”
The members of the group met regularly to talk about what was coming next and what needed to be valued most.
The initial round of educational visioning wrapped up before the initial bond issue vote in May of 2025, but the projects were not funded until the bond issue passed on Nov 4, 2025.
The next phase began and formed a new committee to give input on the design for the actual buildings and additions.
Bryan Knurek, an English teacher at the high school, says that, when given the opportunity to join the new committee to work on design, he took it immediately.
“When I came into my previous districts, they had just finished multi-million-dollar building renovation programs,” Knurek says. “I felt like I had some insight, not only into the process, but also into the good use of renovated space.”
Knurek also says he appreciates that the district values teacher input throughout the planning process.
“Any time a school district says we want to hear what our teachers think and we want you to be part of the process of change from start to finish, I’ve always found value in that,” Knurek says.“Within these meetings, voices are heard equally. It doesn’t really matter what your title is.”
With the design process in development the district hired SHP, also known as Steed, Hammond, and Paul to assist in the process.
“They have people that work on all of the engineering and the design of the building,” says Quick. “That’s the group that’s working with our teams of people right now to make the designs happen.”
The first project to begin will be an addition on Cannan Middle School. For this project, the design process is underway and construction is planned to start during the summer of 2026 and ready for students by August of 2027.
During this design process it is also a part of discussion on the upcoming building for 6-8 middle school, which is planned to be found on the same campus as the high school.
“So they’re designing [the 6-8 building], and they’re designing the addition to the high school at the same time,” says Quick. “There’ll be an addition on [the North] side of the high school that will add lab classrooms, and they’re working on what that’s gonna look like.”
Because the design is still in the beginning stages, questions remain about what the new addition will look like, but, according to Quick, one of the goals is spaces for collaboration.
“maybe like hands-on learning where groups of people could be working together,” says Quick,
“and then making sure that our students feel like this is a place that they feel really well, maybe lots of light and windows and looking at the outside.”
With the upcoming changes, excitement is growing for the possibility of what it could be.
“I’m excited to see how the space is custom fit to us, to Jonathan Alder,” says Knurek, “to the way that our students and then teachers in particular feel that our students will be best served, which is how the community is best served.”
