YOUNGSTOWN — The Youngstown Board of Education has approved a key capital improvement project for what will be the new Youngstown High School beginning in the 2026-27 school year.

“It will have a guardhouse with a school resource officer and a new card access system that monitors who comes and who goes,” Dave Harris, who owns Canfield-based DPH Architecture LLC, said.

Harris gave a presentation at the board’s regular meeting Tuesday at Youngstown Rayen Early College High School outlining the two-phase project regarding how the new school on the East Side — which is currently East High School — will look. A heavy emphasis has been placed on security, aesthetics and providing a welcoming look and atmosphere for students, he noted.

DPH Architects is managing the work.

The project’s first phase also likely will entail added fencing and cleaning the area around the Bennington Avenue entrance, along with a fence around the baseball fields off Parker Avenue, Harris said. He added that as an effort to pay homage to the district’s past, both sides of the guardhouse will feature seven lighted frames between which will be the names of the six former city high schools and the dates they were established.

Much of the proposed Phase II is centered on the school’s main entrance intended to give it the appearance of a large plaza area, with added lighting, a blue-and-white “Y” at the doors, a Defenders logo in front and added foliage. In addition, the plan is to create an under-cover dropoff site for those who use wheelchairs, Harris said.

Plans are in the works to develop a card-access area inside the entrance, he explained.

“We looked at safety in getting people inside as well,” Harris added.

The newly revamped school also will include about 3,000-square-feet of expansion, Stacy J. Quinones, district spokeswoman, said in an email.

Other specific additions are to include a more spacious and larger enclosed lobby, improved open-sight lines from the existing office to the entrance, with a station for a school resource officer, and a new gated entry, Quinones said.

Perhaps one of the most eye-catching elements will be two sets of 10-inch structural steel frames attached to the guardhouse and extending and curving about 30 feet and shaped like an owl’s wings that will be symbolic of the owl, which was chosen as the new mascot, Harris said.

Advertisements for bids to the project’s first phase are to go out Thursday, and the bidding process is to get underway April 1, with hopes of awarding bids “as soon as we can to get this project done this summer,” he said.

The process for the second phase is slightly behind schedule, but it is hoped those documents will be ready a few weeks after Phase I, Harris said.

The consolidation project began months ago as school officials began working with various student and teacher leadership groups. A high priority was creating something that will make the new school feel welcoming so that students feel valued, Robert Kearns, the district’s chief of staff, added.

OTHER PRESENTATIONS

In other business, the Rev. Kenneth L. Simon, New Bethel Baptist Church’s lead pastor, thanked the board for adopting a recent resolution to support Ohio House Bill 610 and Senate Bill 332, both of which are aimed at dissolving academic distress commissions and getting the district out of state control.

Sponsoring the bills are state Rep. Lauren McNally, D-Youngstown, and state Sen. Al Cutrona, R-Canfield, respectively.

The two pieces of legislation, each of which contains language similar to the other, have yet to undergo a series of hearings, Simon noted. He also stressed what he feels is the importance of people monitoring the process of getting both bills passed without any sudden and unrelated language changes or compromises being added.

“It’s incumbent on all stakeholders to work together “to move this district forward. It’s been a long haul from 2015 (when Ohio House Bill 70 was adopted) to now, and we want to see it through to the finish line,” Simon said.

In other business, the board heard a presentation from Phillip Atsas, a teacher in the Campbell School District and former coach who is pushing to have soccer programs in the city schools. Youngstown and one other district are the only two in the Mahoning Valley without such an athletic program, he told the board.

Several attempts to have soccer at East High were unsuccessful, Atsas said, adding that the worldwide sport also provides important life lessons.

Board member Tiffany Patterson, who heads the athletic committee, said she was open to having discussions about that possibility with Atsas.