December 21, 2003
The Muskegon Chronicle
By Lynn Moore

This is not their parents' vocational ed center.

When high school students begin attending the new Muskegon Area Career Tech Center in 2005, they'll be running their own restaurant, caring for children in their own day-care center, working on cars in a state-of-the-art garage with heated floors and operating their own greenhouse and flower shop.

Along with the latest technology in 16 career areas, the voter-financed facility will be ecologically sensitive and energy conscious. Current plans -- which may have to be altered because bids came in slightly higher than expected -- call for using a wind turbine and solar panels and ground source heat pumps for energy.

The $8 million facility, designed by Hooker/De Jong Architects & Engineers with loads of input by business people and teachers, will be built by Muskegon Community College for the Muskegon Area Intermediate School District. The MAISD, which currently is operating the Career Tech Center in temporary classrooms at the college, will have a 50-year lease.

Slated to open by January 2005, the new facility is designed to be an environmentally friendly learning lab -- a building that students will be able to study because of its open ceilings, exposed mechanicals and such innovative features as ground source heat pumps and windows that automatically dim or raise the lights.

"The facility itself will be a community statement," said MAISD Superintendent Michael Bozym. "Usually you build a building and then teach inside it. This building itself will teach."

The building will house career programs ranging from the traditional auto body, welding and health services to more unusual horticulture, e-commerce and early childhood education, with most having their own hands-on learning labs in addition to classrooms.

It also will feature a simulated hospital room, a heating, ventilation and air-conditioning lab with 18 different furnaces for students to work on, and a machine technology room that will be able to manufacture products designed in an adjacent computer-assisted design classroom.

Every feature of the center has been carefully planned, with teachers and advisory committees for each program area visiting other career centers, speaking with state consultants and meeting with architects three or four times for each classroom design, said Gary Martin, director of career and technical education for the MAISD.

"A lot of the spaces were designed by the teachers," said Alan Majeski, the architect with Hooker/De Jong who designed the new building. "Each program is basically a building in itself."

Site preparation for the facility on Stebbins Road behind the college has already begun. Construction, which will be overseen by Muskegon Construction Company, will start once the state approves plans.

When the facility opens, Career Tech Center program offerings will grow from the current 14 to 20. Roughly 1,000 students are expected to attend classes at the center, which will be offered in 2 1/2-hour blocks in morning and afternoon sessions.

Not all Career Tech Center programs will be housed in the new facility. Cosmetology will be at Booker Institute of Cosmetology in Muskegon's Lakeside neighborhood. Construction trades will be operated at Habitat for Humanity building sites. And commercial arts and graphic arts programs will remain in the college's James L. Stevenson Center
for Higher Education.

Martin said the arts programs will stay at the college in keeping with a promise to voters that the Career Tech Center would share space with the college whenever possible.

Being green

From its very beginning, officials say, the Career Tech Center will be a model of "green" building practices.

"We started with the concept of a green building and being environmentally sensitive," Majeski said.

Its size was kept relatively compact at 58,000 square feet to minimize disruption to the wooded site on which it will sit. During construction, separate trash receptacles will be used so discarded building products can be recycled, officials said.

Erosion control will help protect Fourmile Creek, which flows through the MCC campus as well as the new Career Tech Center property. And sanitary sewer pipes will be installed through a boring process rather than the digging of trenches that requires even more tree removal.

Diana Osborn, dean of administrative services at the college, said the land is a "unique ecological setting."

"We don't want to disturb any more of it than we have to," Osborn said.

Once constructed, the school will feature several energy reuse and conservation features. The 3,000-amp electrical service will get some of its power from a wind turbine -- either 85 or 120 feet tall -- and "photovoltaic" solar panels mounted on the greenhouse roof.

Sensors inside the building will turn off lights when no one is occupying a space while sensors on windows will automatically dim and raise the lights according to the amount of sunlight streaming through the windows and numerous skylights.

Ground source heat pumps will send a special liquid through a series of pipes under the school parking lot that will be heated or cooled from the ground and then used to heat or cool classrooms, depending on the season. In addition, heat generated in the welding and auto mechanic rooms will be captured and recycled to heat the building.

Special light shelves over windows will act as shades in summer, and in winter will deflect light further into the building. Even the roof will be white so it will not absorb as much heat in the summer as darker roofs.

In addition, building materials and furnishings, such as carpeting, will have high recycled material content and low chemical emissions, officials said.

"What better way to teach students about good stewardship of the environment," Bozym said. "We're walking the walk."

The programs

Juniors and seniors from 16 public and private high schools will attend the Career Tech Center, in some cases taking college-level courses.

They will have a host of programs from which to choose, including auto service; auto body; heating, venting and air conditioning; welding; machine technology; public safety; financial management; computer maintenance; computer-assisted design; e-commerce and marketing; food and hospitality; early childhood education and horticulture.

Facilities will be first class: auto body will have its own car painting booth; welding will have stations for 22 students to weld at once; and health services will have a hospital-like room with hospital beds and bathroom like those found in health facilities. Horticulture students will take care of the facility's landscaping.

When they finish their studies, many students will be eligible for certification in their fields, including nursing assistant, auto body, auto mechanics, welding, Web design and computer network administration.

In addition, many students will be lined up with apprenticeships.

Martin said he wanted the school to not feel like a school. So when visitors walk in the front door, they'll be greeted by a student-run restaurant, store and flower shop -- giving a feel similar to an airport concourse while giving students real-world lessons on running businesses.

The restaurant will be connected via movable walls to a 100-seat convention center that students will also operate and cater.

And a separate entrance will be provided for parents and children who use the student-run child-care center. The child-care center will be operated by students in the early childhood education program. Their lectures will be given in a classroom separated by one-way glass from the child-care area, allowing students to observe and discuss children at play.

The stores, restaurant and child-care facility won't open with the Career Tech Center. Rather, they will open after students have an opportunity to learn how to operate them, Martin said.

All features of the building will be compiled in a touch-screen kiosk that will be placed near the front entrance. It will allow visitors to view features of every program and will keep real-time tallies of energy being produced by the wind turbine, solar panels and ground source heat pumps.

"This facility is unique in so many ways," said Bozym, the superintendent of MAISD. "We want to model the most efficient and effective design strategies. We want to be a leader ... We want to be good stewards of the environment, and this building shows that."

FAXBOX:

Muskegon Area Career Tech Center Highlights

* Exterior

* On-site storm water collection system will send water back into ground instead of into sewers.

* Photovoltaics on greenhouse roof to create solar energy.

* Translucent panels near roof line will allow additional light into building.

* White roof to prevent heat absorption in summer.

* Sensors on south-facing windows will automatically dim or raise lights according to amount of sunlight

* Interior

* Exposed ceilings and walls will help students understand mechanics of building. Pipes will be color-coded to help students understand what they are.

* Light tubes, a type of skylight, will be used throughout to maximize use of natural daylight.

* Construction will utilize low emission-producing materials, including carpet and paint.

* Heat recovery systems in welding and auto mechanic areas will remove heat from exhausted air and use to heat incoming air.

* Occupancy sensors throughout building will turn off lights when no one around.

* Foods/hospitality area will have full working kitchen with a student-run restaurant. Attached to restaurant via moving walls will be conference center that can seat/feed 100.

* Retail "convenience store" will be connected to e-commerce/marketing classroom.

* Greenhouse will feature heated floors and a connected floral shop.

* Early childhood class will operate a child-care center for 3- and 4-year-olds.  The center will be separated from classroom with one-way glass so students can observe children.  Center will include outdoor playground and its own entrance.

FAXBOX:

Floor plan

* The size of the 58,000-square-foot center was kept "tight" to limit the impact on the environment and the number of trees that had to be removed from its wooded site on Stebbins Road. The center is divided into two main sections, the "high-bay" industrial area in the rear and the more traditional classroom areas in the front. Just off the front entrance are a restaurant with conference center and a store, both of them student-run.

'Green' technology

* A wind turbine located just outside the main entrance is included in tentative plans and would provide some of the energy for the center. The turbine fits in with the environmentally friendly design of the center and would be visible to travelers on U.S. 31. The turbine also would help students learn about alternative energy innovations.

* Light shelves above windows will bounce light farther into the building during winter months, when the sun is lower in the sky, and will act as shades in the summer. As a result, they will help save on lighting and cooling costs.

* Ground source heat pumps will send fluid through a series of underground pipes beneath the student parking lot where it will be heated from the ground in winter and cooled in the summer and then used to heat and cool the building.