After three and a half years of grieving the unspeakable tragedy that unfolded at Sandy Hook Elementary School in late 2012, students and parents will return to a new school building this fall that is meant to heal and protect, as well as educate. The new structure sits farther back on the property and the remaining concrete slabs – complete with their original dinosaur footprints – are in the new parking lot.
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They say they wanted it to honor every victim of the 2012 tragedy.
The news media was given an early look Friday at the newly constructed Sandy Hook Elementary School, WTNH-TV reports.
The school was designed, officials said, to be attractive, environmentally friendly, conducive to learning and, above all, safe.
Building the school on the same site has taken years, and school officials are finally ready to give media a look, according to WFSB.
The school’s superintendent says those students are still recovering in their own ways and school officials will continue to help them moving forward.
The new school, funded by a state grant, has safety features such as impact-resistant windows and state-of-the-art video monitoring. The new school was built to replace the building torn down after a gunman shot dead 20 young children and six educators in a 2012 massacre.
The building consists of more than 25 classrooms with similar motifs and two treehouse spaces on the second floor bring the outdoors inside for the students.
“The 40 percent not returning does not indicate, in any margin, those unable or unwilling”, Erardi said, adding that “We probably had a handful of staff members, who due to their own personal recovery and rebuild, have chosen to be in a different part of our district”.
Sandy Hook Principal Kathy Gombos said she expects the transition to be hard emotionally.
“As architects, we aspire to opportunities like this: to be involved in the design of a building like the Sandy Hook School, a meaningful and symbolic building that truly serves a community on so many levels, today and for generations to come”, said Brotman”.
None of them witnessed the shootings, which were heard throughout the school, prompting students to hide where they could in their classrooms until the building was cleared by police.
The architect is Svigals + Partners, and the construction manager is Consigli Construction.
There have been some tears, but I think after they spend an hour or so here, they feel like it’s going to be an unbelievable learning space for kids.
There will be a more public memorial elsewhere in town.
“That is what a school should be”, said Moran, “the excitement of learning and seeing all the new stuff”.
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The construction site of the new Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newton, Connecticut, appears in a photo dated July 29, 2016.
