It isn’t as high a priority as safety, function and durability but aesthetics and instilling community pride rank right up there when it comes to how Manteca Unified spends bond money to modernize campuses.

“It is important students have a pleasing learning environment,” pointed out District Superintendent Clarke Burke.

He noted, however, that whatever is done can’t take away from the directive by the school board that bond proceeds be spent as effectively and efficiently as possible. That applies to the $159 Measure “G” projects now being wrapped up and the $260 million Measure “A” expenditures that start in earnest next year.

 At older campuses where additions and portables were added over the years, there is often a jarring visual disconnect.

The campus where that is most evident is Manteca High where some of the buildings are approaching 60 years in age.

The industrial arts building — the oldest on campus — was determined to be a more cost effective venture to modernization than build a new structure. That said the district is incorporating a similar façade to make it blend in seamlessly with the just completed wing of 10 new classrooms.

Similar architectural treatments will be applied throughout the phased work at Manteca High.

“Manteca High was the most challenging because of various add on (projects) over the years,” pointed out Manteca Unified Director of Operations and Facilities Aaron Bowers.

The upgrades are more than skin deep.

Besides similar efforts inside classrooms and other campus buildings the district has made sure to honor — and carry on — traditions. That was high up on the list of input the district received from the community.

Those among the hundreds of campus murals that could be lost due to the replacement of classrooms have been memorialized by documenting each of them. Some may eventually be recreated within the architecture of the new campus design.

The inside of the new gym will include a series of professional murals highlighting the 101-year-old campus’ tradition.

And while some in the community pushed hard to have a replica of the beloved tower built in 1922 and destroyed by a wrecking ball in 1969 included in the design of the new 2-story classroom building the costs didn’t pencil out.

Images of the tower, however, will be incorporated into a history walk in the new student quad.

The desire to safeguard tradition even went as far as naming the new quad that connects the new gym and new swimming pool with the existing gym Pennebaker Plaza.

It is a nod to Pennebaker Field where the Buffaloes first played football. When Gus Schmiedt Field was built in the 1950s the Pennebaker name was transferred to a softball field that was removed to build the gym, swimming pool and adjoining plaza.

The commitment to tying in architecture of existing and modernization projects has also occurred at elementary schools.

Two examples are Golden West School and Lincoln School.

The design of Golden West School was coordinated to blend into the surrounding commercial district.

And the glass wall and glass doors at the main campus entrance do double duty as a sound buffer for Main Street traffic noise in addition to accenting the architecture.

The multipurpose room at Lincoln School and adjoining office was designed in modernistic style to blend in with the architectural sensibilities that were all the rage when the original campus buildings were constructed in 1947.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com