Albany Park school community comes together to fix up building, playground at Haugan Elementary
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Folks at Helge A. Haugan Elementary School in Albany Park spent years band-aiding problems such as leaking classrooms and common areas and a torn-up playground.
But now, as CBS 2's Tara Molina reported Tuesday, the school community has come together to push for real change and fixes - as they gear up for the first day of school on Monday.
In one major and quite visible improvement, students at Haugan Elementary, 4540 N. Hamlin Ave., will soon go from playing on barren, crumbling asphalt to a having a beautiful brand-new playground at their disposal.
Meanwhile, the school also used to have a leaky roof with water and mold issues.
"You had no way of knowing where water was going to be," said longtime Haugan Elementary teacher Mary Orr, "and there would always, you know, be like pop-ups all over the place."
The water and mold issues impacting learning…
"Any rainy day, we were on emergency mode," said Haugan Elementary Principal Heather Yutzy, "relocated kids in classes with buckets."
That roof has now been replaced with a brand-new roof with a 20-year warranty.
Any building built in 1910 is going to need some TLC. But a group from across the school community said Haugan Elementary needed it desperately - for years.
"A couple years ago, it was just very clear that the building needed attention," Yutzy said.
Parents, teachers, administrators, and community members spoke out on behalf of the school – spending a year and a half fighting for fixes and improvements.
"We spearheaded a door-to-door campaign to get all the neighbors involved," Orr said.
"We went to every single board meeting," added parent Tiffany Harvey.
The fight paid off. The Chicago Public Schools stepped in.
"This big, huge district listening to our school," said longtime community member and now teacher Heather Robarge.
"It restores a lot of faith in the system that CPS did listen to us," added Harvey.
Harvey reached out to us to share the group's story.
"As we started to work on this, we noticed that the more privileged schools have so much more than our school does - which serves a primarily minority and low-income population," Harvey said.
Haugan is 915 students strong – and 79 percent of Haugan's students qualify for free or reduced lunch.
"It's so meaningful we got these improvements," Harvey said.
Harvey's daughter, almost-fourth-grader Amalia, couldn't be more excited about the improvements – the playground in particular.
"I love the new trees," Amalia said, "and it just looks like a really fun area."
The community group has a message heading ahead of the first day of school next week, to anyone fed up with band-aids over real fixes.
"Schools are a big deal. They're the backbone of our community," said Robarge, "and I want other people to know they can do this in their community too."
A ribbon-cutting planned for later in the week at Haugan, with a plan to have most of the work finished by the start of school next week.
Meanwhile, the Chicago Public Schools released the following statement about schools and facility upgrades:
"Chicago Public Schools (CPS) strives to ensure students in every neighborhood have access to safe, accessible, high-quality facilities where they can play and learn. The District's Capital Plan is focused on facility updates that achieve an optimal standard of physical condition for each school through renovations and those that improve learning through educational enhancements and innovative design."
CPS noted that the average age of its buildings is 83 years. The district said it now has 62 active site improvement projects – of which 55 include playground improvements. Haugan is among those 55.
CPS emphasized that the main focus for playground upgrades is for pupils to have a safe play area. Priority goes to replacing older playground equipment, and replacing aged surfaces with wood chips and modern pour-in surfaces, CPS said.
CPS said it completed its most recent round of biennial assessments during the 2021-2022 school year to determine critical facility needs. The assessments can be found at the CPS Facility Condition website.
CPS also provided a list of all ongoing capital needs projects.
