Sweetwater High to get $46 million in upgrades - Classrooms, theater and offices will be built - LINK
By Tanya Sierra, UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER - Saturday, January 9, 2010 at 12:02 a.m.

An artist’s rendering of new buildings at Sweetwater High School in National City.

NATIONAL CITY — South County’s oldest high school is undergoing a much-needed renovation, which will include for the first time in district history a three-story building with an atrium.Sweetwater, National City’s lone high school, is getting more than $46 million in upgrades, including new classrooms, a new library, a new theater and new counseling and administration offices funded by school bond measure Proposition O.“The nicest public building in the entire South Bay will soon rise on the corner of 30th and Highland,” Principal Wes Braddock said. “We are so ecstatic.”Sweetwater High School dates back to 1920 and has long been a tightly knit community hub whose alumni make up all of the elected positions at City Hall.Over the summer, the school’s “100 building,” which contained classrooms, the theater, library and administrative offices, was demolished. It will be rebuilt over the next year and a half. Then phase two begins, which will replace three classroom buildings with a single, two-story structure.“There will be dramatically increased space, trees and green area for students,” Braddock said.The school’s dire parking situation will be addressed, too. Currently, there are only 75 parking spaces for the school’s 2,500 students and 150 staffers. After the renovations, there will be up to 300 parking spots, Braddock said.With expanded space, Braddock said he wants to expand the school to include ninth-graders from Granger Junior High.Granger is the only school in the Sweetwater district that has a ninth-grade class. Each year, parents choose whether they want their students to stay at Granger or take ninth-grade classes at Sweetwater High. Most choose to stay, officials said.“It’s not a good thing to have half of our ninth-grade class at another school,” he said. “There’s also accountability implications by having the ninth-graders over there.”National City Mayor Ron Morrison, who graduated from Sweetwater in 1968, said he has seen the school languish over the years and is happy it is getting the improvements it deserves.“Even when I went there, the buildings were old then,” Morrison said. “A lot of people say you are a product of your environment and while I’m sure that’s true, students have done well there. They deserve to have the same things other students in the district have.”Proposition O, which voters passed in November 2006, is a $644 million school bond that will improve the district’s schools and classrooms. About seven years ago, three wings of classrooms and science labs at Sweetwater were modernized and a new gym and lockers were built under Proposition BB, a $187 million bond passed in 2000.Morrison said it was not enough.“The renovations that were done a few years ago was just patchwork,” he said.Both Braddock and Morrison said district Superintendent Jesus Gandara, who said he would make a model out of Sweetwater, has stayed true to his word.“If it hadn’t been for the arrival of Jesus Gandara, who had a different vision for what our school needed, this wouldn’t have happened,” Braddock said.