LAST week, the breaker switch in one of the classrooms in Building E at Hopwood Junior High School suddenly popped. The room was in complete darkness. There are only a few aircon units in the building but the electrical system is too weak to accommodate extra power loads.
Hopwood has experienced similar electrical problems since 1998 according to David M. Borja, the school principal.
This may not be a danger in the real sense, but Borja also expects that frequent “disruption” of classes will occur if the problem will not be remedied immediately.
The electrical problem in that classroom where Nicolas Pascale teaches special education subjects was already addressed.
The Commonwealth Utilities Corp., with the assistance of Don Dolenec, the Public School System’s project manager of construction, spent three days to have it fixed.
But some of the school’s aircon units continue to emit foul odor. Moreover, some electrical wirings needed to be upgraded especially in some buildings that were built in the 1960s.
“The original structure of Hopwood was designed to allow natural ventilation. In the late 1990s, some of the skinny wires in the buildings were replaced to accommodate additional appliance. But the upgrade is not yet complete, and there should be an overhaul of the system,” said Borja in an interview yesterday.
Recently, the U.S. Department of the Interior allocated $81,500 of Compact Impact funds for Hopwood’s electrical upgrade project.
But Interior later disapproved the utilization of the fund due to the alleged failure of the Public School System to submit the required scope of work for the project.
Borja said Hopwood and the PSS were addressing the problem. He explained that the electrical upgrade was used to be handled by then PSS-CIP engineer Christopher F. Fryling.
He said there will be some adjustments to make, now that Dolenec is taking charge of the project.
Borja said the scope of work was done based on the electrical problems they encountered in 1998.
He said that the scope of work did not require any major change in the use of buildings.
But the basis for the scope of work changed on Dec. 21, 2001 with the decision to move 700 of Hopwood’s 1,400 students to the new middle school in Kagman.
Based on this decision, classrooms in Building A would be transformed into an administration office while the current administration office would be developed into a library.
But Borja said they learned early this year that the middle school in Kagman could only accommodate approximately 450 students. Thus, the present use of the buildings will be maintained. “Instead of 700, only 450 students will move to the new school. It is also expected that there will be a 5 percent increase in the number of Hopwood enrollees for the next school, so there’ll be no more changes in the use of the buildings. We will stick to the Dec. 2001 scope of work and see to it that the project will push through. This will all be for the sake of students,” he said.
