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Dozen San Bernardino high school, middle school cafeterias getting facelift
By MATT LEEDY
Reprinted from the San Bernardino County Sun
SAN BERNARDINO — When they return to class Tuesday, San Bernardino High School students will find sock hops, doo-wops and poodle skirts are back in style — at least in the cafeteria.
The newly renovated dining facilities at San Bernardino High and Curtis and Shandin Hills middle schools are the first of 12 secondary schools in the San Bernardino City Unified School District scheduled to be revamped.
San Bernardino High’s cafeteria features a 1950s theme, trimmed in black-and-red school colors. It comes complete with a jukebox featuring 100 compact discs that will pipe top Billboard hits from 1955 and beyond through the lunch room.
The Drifters’ "Under the Boardwalk" played as Principal Karen Craig led a tour this week through soda fountain stools, booths and black-and-white pictures of Ray Charles and Ritchie Valens.
"We believe this is the first high school in California to look the way this does," Craig said. "Every student who has come in here has been, 'Oh, wow. I hope they take care of it.' I told them, 'You are they.'"
The cafeteria is highlighted by a replica Chevrolet Bel Air with the back end converted into a large seat. Only students who invite a teacher or staff member will be allowed to sit in the car seat. Only students who invite a teacher or staff member will be allowed to sit in the car seat.
"Absolutely beautiful," said Chuck Oversby, an 11th and 12th grade science teacher, who saw the cafeteria for the first time Wednesday.
"It's going to be a nice environment for the kids. They’re going to want to be in there now. It’s got personality."
Two 36-inch televisions also are prominently displayed. the monitors will replay Cardinal Football games and footage from clubs, the band and the ROTC’s multimedia class, Craig said.
The district’s four traditional high schools and eight middle schools are scheduled to have remodeled cafeterias by the end of the year. The teachers lounge at each school also are receiving a face-lift.
Each high school cafeteria will be upgraded with an individual theme in mind.
Pacific High School, whose mascot is the Pirates, will have a nautical design. The Spartans of San Gorgino High School will dine in a roman-style cafeteria. The Cowboys at Cajon High School will be surrounded by images of the Old West.
Interior System Inc. of Minneapolis is handling all the remodeling.
The project is expected to cost about $1.8 million. the district’s nutrition services department already has spent $170,000 to complete San Bernardino High School’s cafeteria and approximately $50,000 a peice to refurbish Curtis and Shandin Hills middle schools.
John Peukert, director of nutrition services, said his department has a separate fund within the district’s budget that is maintained by federal and state money, a la carte sales and child-care services offered throughout the city.
Over the past seven years, nutrition services has saved money for the project by operating out of a single, 46,000 square foot centralized kitchen at Cajon, Peukert said.
"Because of that, we were able to run things efficiently and save some money," Peukert said. "And we wanted to do them all together. Not one one year and one the next. That would be less climactic."
the middle schools are receiving less dramatic alterations with new furniture and paint — all centered around an academic and sports theme.
But in the two middle-school cafeterias that already have been remodeled, the changes have gone far in brightening the rooms’ atmosphere.
"Before, this was one of the most depressing places at school, as far as I was concerned," Curtis Principal James Alvarado said. "It really needed to be perked up."
Much of the paint and chairs that were replaced dated back to 1967, Alvarado said.
Aside from their aesthetic qualities, the renovations also expanded the seating capacity in the Curtis cafeteria by 100 students.
"Before, we were lucky if we could get 300 in here," Alvarado said. "Now we can get 400 to 450 in here comfortably."
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