ADVICE
FEATURES
Read about reflections and tips for the upcoming school year.
Students and teachers share their travels from the summer break.
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Palo Alto Unified School District Henry M. Gunn High School 780 Arastradero Rd Palo Alto, CA 94306
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Friday, August 16, 2024 Volume 62, Special Edition
780 Arastradero Road, Palo Alto, CA 94306
New administration, food services building slated to open in January Sylvie Nguyen News Editor
With interior wall finishes, ducts, ceilings, l ig ht i ng, e x ter ior s t uc c o, g la z i ng, a nd landscaping installations progressing during the summer, phase one of Gunn’s construction project is projected to be completed in January, with the A- and B-buildings fully in use. The construction crew will move towards the final stages that include department approvals. Starting in January 2025 and finishing in fall 2025, phase two — which is to convert the culinary classrooms in the K-building into two Science Labs — will start after the full completion of phase one and finish in fall 2025. This construction plan that began in the fall of 2022 included a major modernization of the administration office, cafeteria and exterior and interior dining halls. The A-building will house administration facilities, a nurse’s office, a multi-purpose room for teacher meetings and additional eating areas. The B-building will feature a Design Studio and classrooms and a kitchen for Culinary Arts. With the new administration office’s “courtyard-like entrance”, Senior Construction Manager Mohammed Sedqi explains that its
location was most suitable for parents’ and visitors’ way finding and staffs’ supervision. “The best architecture is when you don’t need a sign saying ‘admin is there’. You want to just arrive at the parking lot and clearly know where it is,” he said. “The entrance is facing the parking lot, so it’s this new face to the school entrance that helps promote the sense of place at the school.” The renovation work includes adding 8,000 square feet to the existing 12,000 square feet of building. During the process, the crew tackled challenges with remodeling an existing building, such as the absence of utilities lines underground and older, incorrect spokes. Sedqi also said that potential setbacks in regulatory food space checkpoints will not be a major problem, ensuring a timely debut. PAUSD Facilities & Construction Director Eric Holm describes that many tasks, including installations of electrical wiring, landscaping and planters, were allocated to start between the end of school and start of summer school to prevent disruption during the school year. The construction team planned to repave the streets and repaint the main exit when summer school ended on July 19. “We t r y to have t he least a mount of
disturbance to students, so we use the summer to work outside of the fences of the building construction site,” he said. “So to connect the entire power of the buildings, we had to shut down the entire campus for three days.”
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“We try to have the least amount of disturbance to students, so we use the summer to work outside of the fences of the building construction site.” —PAUSD Facilities & Construction Director Eric Holm
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Sedqi expresses a similar sentiment. “Because of the first winter storm that hit us hard, we had a challenging period with a mud pit in construction for months,” he said. “Otherwise, summer is when we make a lot of progress without things that hit a delay like interrupting school activity.” Construction update—p.2
Jesse Li
School namesake Henry M. Gunn left lasting impact on Bay Area education Brian Xiao Oracle Alumni
Jennifer Li
Many of Palo Alto’s well-known landmarks and locations bear recognizable names. Hoover Tower, Jane Lathrop Stanford Middle School, a nd Hewlet t-Pack a rd Garage ring a bell for most. Gunn High School’s namesake, however, is perhaps less well-known. Henry Martin Gunn was born in Lexington, Kentucky, on July 7, 1898, and moved to Oregon at the
age of 12. He attended the University of Oregon and received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees there, serving in the Nav y during World War I in the midst of his studies. He then attended graduate school at Stanford, completing a master’s degree in education before moving back to Oregon to become a principal in the Portland school system. While taking nighttime university courses there, he met his wife Thelma Eiler, an art teacher at the time. As his reputation grew, Gunn moved into
the superintendent position for the Eugene School District and then transitioned to the university level, teaching education at the University of Southern California before becoming president of Western Oregon University. After three years there, PAUSD hired him as superintendent in 1950. Gunn’s foremost priority for students in the district was to improve their standardized testing performance. Gunn—p.2