The site and building were designed to separate the often conflicting parent drop-off/pick-up and faculty parking areas. The bright, open lobby, often used as a place for informal student and parent gathering, is the nexus for all circulation and public events at the school, a comfortable living room that visually connects the cafetorium, library, and arts spaces.
Renewal Through Consolidation
After years of debate and several town delays, SMMA's comprehensive renovation of the Town of Stow’s beloved Center School building, along with substantial new construction, brought the community together in celebration of the project.
The facility serves 600 K-5 students and 30 pre-K students in a 98,000-square-foot facility that brings two schools together. The project vacated the K-2 Pompositticut School, constructed as an open plan school in 1973, joining it with grades 3-5 at the original Center School location, built in 1954 (with additions in 1956 and 1958), and thereby providing a single elementary school for the town.
The project vacated the K-2 Pompositticut School, constructed as an open plan school in 1973, joining it with grades 3-5 at the original Center School location and thereby providing a single elementary school for the town.
The new Center School’s “T" shape breaks the facility into an early childhood wing, an elementary wing, and a public wing, joined at the T with administration, art, and media center spaces. Taking advantage of the lower-height original wing for early childhood classrooms, the volume of the school’s Great Hall was reinvented for music classrooms.