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Capital Gifts

Capital Giving

 

Gifts to capital improvements help us meet needs, goals and dreams to maintain the high standard of excellence at Our Lady of Sorrows. Capital gifts are made to the Saints for Tomorrow Annual Fund and designated by donors for a specific capital improvement including facility improvements, academic updates, and identity enhancements.  Capital gifts designations are made in collaboration with the School Leadership Team to align with the current goals and missions of the school.

2021-2022 Capital Improvements:
After upgrading all of the teacher computers during the prior school year, we completed the installation of the latest generation of wireless technology WiFi 6 throughout our campus. This powerful infrastructure has enabled us to purchase an additional 325 HP Chromebooks and 100 new Apple iPads. These devices now bring the school to a one wireless device per student school ratio. To help support this large increase in network traffic, we have upgraded our network electronics to the latest generation and installed a dedicated 1 gigabyte fiberoptic internet connection to provide ample bandwidth to all of the new devices.
To help improve instruction in the classroom, we have installed the TeachLogic classroom audio system in every classroom. The audio system helps with instruction by reducing teacher fatigue and increases intelligibility of the instruction for the students. We have also improved the sound system in the cafeteria for seminars and presentations. 
Student safety is always on our agenda when improvements are discussed. A few years ago, new heavy-duty hollow metal doors were installed in the Middle School classrooms through a grant from the Michigan State Police. This year, we have installed the same doors in the elementary school classrooms. The new doors provide a much harder barrier to penetrate than the solid wood doors they are replacing. A camera surveillance system has been installed on the interior and exterior of the school buildings. The system will help with student safety and discipline. 
The interior hallways of the school have received a fresh coat of paint. We have also removed ceiling tiles in the middle school upper hallways to provide for a higher ceiling height. 
Improvements in the classrooms continue with the installation of carpet in eight rooms in the 7th and 8th grade classroom wings. The existing floors were uneven from prior repairs to the radiant floor heating system and the floor tile was very old. By installing carpet in the classrooms, we achieve a level floor and lower noise levels. 
A noticeable improvement will be the installation of campus signage. This signage was the major funding goal of our spring Gala. Due to delays with permit issues, the signage was installed during the 2022-2023 school year.  To help light up our campus at night we have replaced all of the exterior building flood lights along Power Road with new LED lights to provide greater visibility of the grounds during the evening hours. 
In September, we replaced the main four entry doors and frame to the school with new doors and frame. The existing frame has shifted due to excessive salt corrosion. Another very noticeable improvement is the replacement of the sidewalk concrete by the Early Childhood entrance. The existing concrete had heaved and shifted causing a trip hazard. We added three additional parking spots to help with the pick-up and drop-off of students
 
Our biggest improvement was the purchase of 350 new double entry desks for the middle school grades 5th through 8th grade. The new desks are built stronger, they have a larger writing surface, and a more comfortable seat. These new desks will help students focus better in class and provide an excellent workspace for learning. We replaced the aging floor covering in the upper floor of the middle school and the school office with new carpeting. Another large project was the replacement of the roof over the main hallway of the school office. The roofing membrane reached the end of its life and had been leaking for a few years. A much appreciated improvement was the replacement of all of the teacher computers that were 10 years old with new high speed computers with the latest version of Microsoft Office and an upgraded email system to operate in the cloud on the Microsoft Exchange 365 platform. With all of the new computers, iPads, and Chromebooks on campus, we added a second high speed internet connection to our network to provide for faster internet speeds, load balancing, and failover connection. In our efforts to improve indoor air quality, we installed new windows that open in the 6 early childhood classrooms as well as classrooms 117 and 118. These rooms now have operable windows to allow for additional fresh outdoor air to improve the indoor air environment.
Our capital improvements addressed a new set of COVID-19 upgrades as we prepared to welcome our students back to a safe and healthy school environment. Our updates included touchless faucets and flush valves in every school bathroom, and touchless water bottle refill stations. We added concrete walkways outside of our kindergarten and first grade classroom exit doors so that students enter the building through multiple entrances to maintain social distancing. To ensure smaller class sizes, we purchased additional furniture to outfit an additional classroom. Finally, we were able to finish the installation of new projectors and whiteboards in our upper elementary, and expanded the wireless network to accommodate more devices.
We addressed several capital improvement issues including replacing the rooftop air conditioning units for the gymnasium and the Family Center. We upgraded the sound system in the gymnasium to increase clarity of speech during assemblies, concerts, mass, and other functions. Our elementary school hallway carpet was replaced with rubber floor covering that provides unparalleled durability as well as very low future maintenance costs. We increased our wireless network capacity and purchased new grade level Chromebooks to accommodate web-based standardized testing implemented by the Archdiocese.
 
With your support we created a lasting impact for current and future OLS graduates with environment improvements to campus hallways in the form of painting and new flooring in the Lower Elementary hallways and “OLS blue” lockers in the Upper Elementary hallways.
With generous support from our donors, we updated campus technology to ensure the high quality of excellence in education that we have come to expect from Our Lady of Sorrows. With your support we enhanced classrooms with Promethean Boards, computer upgrades, and audio systems. We added best practice materials in the form of an 18 month Curriculum Alignment Project, Developmental Reading Assessment Kits, and leveled books for classroom libraries. We purchased twenty new ipads minis with ipad cart for The Daily 5 literacy implementation.