• All interior walls have been framed out, so we can all now experience the true shape of the place.
• The plumbers have begun building out our entirely new system from 3rd floor to basement.
• The final sprinkler, lighting, heating, insulation, and siding specifications have been sent out to bid.

As for our parent work this weekend, its time to replace the windows.  The shipment of over 40 windows will be on site come Saturday morning, and we’ll have them all in by Sunday evening.

Additional project samples for this weekend:

• Floor patching.
• Finishing some light framing.
• Wall padding in preparation for sheet rock.
• Plenty of cleaning throughout.
• Some yard work.

Sign Up
There are work slots remaining, so please sign up.  Particularly if you have not had the chance to sign up for your full compliment of shifts – we would love to see every family participate as much as possible.  The sign up sheet at school might not reflect last minute changes, so if there are no free slots please feel free to write your shift in the margin: more are always welcome!  If you have questions ask Stephanie Hirsch, who is organizing sign up.

When to arrive
Pros and Workers should be on-site at the new building at 9am for AM shift, 1pm for PM shift.
Helpers should be at the current building at 8:45am and 12:45pm respectively.

What to bring
Pros and Workers: we need plenty of cordless screw guns for this project, so bring one along with a fully charged battery.  Helpers: dress comfortably for childcare and errand-running.

Are you taking advantage of childcare?  We need to know.
Email Shona Simkin, childcare coordinator, by Wednesday 5/12 with: a) your work time slots, b) number of children, and c) age of children.  If you have a child outside Agassiz school-age range (2-5), you must contact Shona to see how this can be accommodated.  We will have snacks for the kids, but please pack them a lunch as you would on a standard Agassiz day.

For Fun
On Saturday, we are panning a short end-of-workday hang-out with pizza and beer at the current Cambridge Agassiz building for folks who want to relax after the dust settles.

Coming Up
As the pace of the work quickens, we anticipate adding an additional weekend or two for specific projects come June and July.  For instance, there is considerable interest in our outdoor space and we anticipate having a specific landscaping weekend.  Dust off your shovels – there will be lots of dirt to move!

Any questions can go to Ben Mayer, or if specific to
Sign up, contact Stephanie Hirsch at shirsch@sprynet.com
Childcare, contact Shona Simkin at shona.simkin@gmail.com

Have you ever ripped shingles off the wall of a building?

I hadn’t either, but that’s part of what I got to do on the February work weekend at Agassiz’s new building. More than 20 parents spent the day at the building taking walls down, patching floorboards, cleaning out the basement, and pulling out nails from boards that could be salvaged for re-use. I also had the privilege of using a big shop vac to vacuum up lots of debris, which was very satisfying .

At the end of the day, my muscles were sore and my clothes were dirty. But I felt closer to the other sweaty, happy folks I had been working with, and I know our effort will be worth it when I see the look on my son’s face when he sees his new school building this Fall.

Wonderful new facilities and communities are coming to life from the hard work-physical, administrative, educational, philanthropic-of all the members of the extended Agassiz family.

Feel free to keep up to date with how we are doing by checking out our website and Facebook page. As always, thanks for all you do to help create this new building for our children.

• Exterior perspective view from Summer Street
• Kitchen
• Play nook
• Bench / “Stage”
• Play loft
• North and West Elevations
• Basement and First Floor Plans
• Second and Third Floor Plans
• South Elevation

As construction begins in earnest on our new building at 184 Summer Street, we’ve decided it would be a good idea to provide the Agassiz community [past, present, and future!] with weekly updates on what’s happening at the site, what’s coming down the pike, and what opportunities there are to volunteer some sweat equity.  I’ll be posting every Friday with a report from the field.  We’re also working on getting architect’s drawings, photos of construction, etc up on a separate page on the website – keep an eye open for  it….

So to start – a quick recap of where we are so far:  About 90% of the demolition has been done by our volunteer crews, and we’ve gotten a price of about $4K to complete the structural demolition [i.e., taking down walls that are part of the structural system of the building and therefore require some careful reinforcing before they come down].  The five work days we had over the summer and fall pulled – wait for it – over 30 TONS of demolition debris out of the building, and my conservative estimate is that it saved us about $10K in demolition costs.  Not bad for five days of work!  Joel Bennett has been a great additional help in doing some of the trickier demolition – electrical, plumbing, etc – and in creatively finding ways to save us money:  like plumbing and installing a salvaged toilet in the basement to save us the 6-month rental of a $125/mo port-a-potty!  Joel has also generally been keeping the building safe before the Ed Herman, the general contractor, takes de facto ownership of the site for a few months.

In recent weeks, Ed and I have been working with the structural engineer on refining his drawings.  The building’s age and the number of additions that have been put on over the years conspired to befuddle us in several places, but we now have a final set of drawings in place and Ed has received several bids on the framing (installation of steel beams; building of new stairs, a new roof, and interior walls; etc).  There are lots of little bits of framing, closing holes in the floor, reinforcing or replacing studs, disconnecting old radiators, etc that are just waiting for some volunteers to come by and do some Saturday. Joel and I will be organizing another work-day some time after Thanksgiving for anyone who is itching to put their tool belt on for a day.

We also have been waiting for the utility companies to come and take protective measures around the power and phone lines on the site before excavators start rolling in, but a drive by the site this morning revealed that this work has [finally] been done.  What this means is that the visible work will really start to pick up in the next two weeks:  an excavator will come in to dig a hole for the new stair tower next to the driveway, a demolition crew will come in to remove the porch and a large portion of the roof, and the framers will begin building a new roof, = installing steel, etc.  This is when things will start to get exciting!

As always, please feel free to email with questions or suggestions:  josh.safdie@gmail.com.

Cheers!

Josh