The loud, obnoxious work of the drills, hammers and power tools have almost come to a close here at Freedom High School. Last year, the school board approved and chose to move forward with a project that would renovate the high school. The district hired Gurtner Construction Co., Inc. to perform the renovations. The main focus of the project would be the doors and windows.

The window units are custom made to fit the walls of each classroom.

“They take longer to install, but are higher quality units,” Principal William Deal said.

They are almost completely done with the doors and windows, aside from needing a few touch-ups. Once finished, the gray doors will be painted brown in order to match the colors of the school itself. Once all of the hard labor work is done, the next step is one that will revolutionize this high school.

Electronics will be applied to the doors and connected to the fire alarms. The doors will be able to close by themselves whenever the fire alarms sound. They will be locked from the outside, but will be able to open from the inside. This will create a safer environment and easy exit for anyone in the building, in the case of an emergency.

Throughout the process, there has been a lot of masonry work as well as repairs to damaged parts of the building. Workers have been at the school through the evenings of the past several months, working tirelessly to get the job done.

“The guys putting in the windows and doors have done a great job,” Assistant Principal Steven Mott said.

These new windows are meant to make the rooms brighter to create a better setting for teaching and learning.

“Previously, there were classrooms that were opaque… they look a lot better with the new windows,” Mott said.

The better quality windows do not only make the room brighter, they also help with the temperatures in most classrooms. Many students have been complaining for years about certain rooms being too cold in the winter when the temperature is low. With the added sunlight comes warmth. When the new blinds are put in place, they will be able to cool down rooms when they get too hot during the spring and summer time.

Overall, both Deal and Mott believe that these renovations will benefit students and teachers in the long run. The process might be annoying to some students because of the tools being used, but they believe that the process has been otherwise painless and very much worth the cost.

“Everything has gone pretty well and according to plan,” Deal said.

Students should expect most of the work to be done within the following months and into the beginning of next school year.