The Vashon Island School District has been developing a capital facilities plan for the past four years. For the last two years, I have been honored to be a member, along with school board chair Bob Hennessey, of the capital facilities steering committee made up of the superintendent, district staff, a citizen expert review panel and architectural and public involvement consultants.

The steering committee has collected data and assessed the current state of our facilities both from a building condition and educational and technological suitability point of view. We have built upon the substantial financial investment of the former campus master planning process.

I believe the board is largely in agreement on the magnitude of the capital needs facing us — especially with respect to Vashon High School (VHS). We also agree that we may not have the resources to address every need in the district so will have to prioritize.

However, we do have differing opinions on where on the spectrum between “do nothing but keep our kids dry” and “fix everything” the solution should be. This article is my personal assessment of the most critical facilities needs in the Vashon school system and does not represent the views of the school board. I will focus on the high school, although there are important needs district wide.

The fundamental problem facing VHS is that it is an archipelago of isolated, aging buildings — many of which have reached the end of their useful lives. This affects teaching and learning in a number of ways.

Inefficiency: Our buildings were built in an era of cheap energy. With a half dozen small buildings scattered around the campus, the district must maintain numerous mechanical and electrical systems. Thus the district spends enormous amounts of money keeping all of these buildings warm and lit. Savings in this area could go directly to hiring teachers, buying materials and reducing class size.

Isolation: At VHS, we only have one building that really promotes collaboration among teachers. I would like to see this model everywhere at VHS — buildings designed so that teachers in all disciplines can meet over a cup of coffee, discuss a problem with a colleague or share ideas about teaching techniques.

Lack of space: We are so short of space that we have itinerant teachers moving from room to room teaching in other teachers’ rooms during their prep times. Many classrooms are too small to properly proctor exams. A typical classroom at VHS is 20 to 25 percent smaller than a typical classroom at Chautauqua or McMurray, and we all know how much bigger a high schooler is than a fourth-grader.

Lack of quality space: Many of our academic spaces do not meet the needs of the instruction taking place in them. For example, the VHS theater is in reality an upgraded lecture hall. Other rooms lack adequate natural light or serve purposes they weren’t designed for. Poor academic facilities decrease our ability to attract and retain the best teachers.

Lack of flexibility: Education is becoming increasingly project-based and less the lecture-take-notes-take-test model most parents on Vashon are familiar with. Because of technology and pervasive communication, education is becoming less “stand and deliver” with teachers imparting knowledge from the lectern. Education is becoming bi-directional, with knowledge flowing “uphill” and everywhere in between. Future vocational spaces need to be flexible to accommodate the skills society needs now and in the future.

Our capital facilities plan needs to look to the future rather than the past. While it is important that we save and repurpose facilities when appropriate, we should do so only if it is fiscally responsible and clearly enhances the delivery of education.

We should accept that many of our high school and district facilities are at the end of their useful lives. The high school is a dinosaur designed for the educational world of a generation ago when Vashon was a vastly different place.

While we can disagree whether Vashon kids deserve the best facilities and what “best” means, few will argue our kids deserve the worst facilities.

I have repeatedly heard from Islanders that all we need is to keep our kids dry, as if keeping the rain out is a worthy aspiration. I for one will proudly ask the voters to invest in a high school that the Island can take pride in and helps us do our job even better.

It is true that our teachers are doing a great job under trying conditions, and I applaud them. However, VHS Principal Susan Hanson summed it up best: “Imagine what we could do if our high school supported education rather than hindered it?”

—John “Oz” Osborne is a member of the Vashon Island School District board of directors and the father of two.