A month ago, I asked the following question on the “School Construction News” discussion blog:  “Have any of you used a Permanent Modular Building System to expand existing school campuses or build entire new campuses? It appears to work especially well with rural schools.”  I expected to hear primarily from small rural districts. 

Instead two large, prominent school districts, Milmont School District in Reading, Pennsylvania, and Miami-Dade School District in Florida commented that they regularly used permanent modular construction to add new campuses and expand existing ones.

While Ramtech worked in Texas with both the Arlington and Alief Independent School Districts in expanding a number of their campuses, most urban school districts throughout the Southwest do not realize that permanent modular construction is a perfect building system for expanding existing school campuses.   Ramtech has been active in school construction for over 30 years and its Accelerated Building System saves both time and money compared to traditional site construction. 

Why do districts like Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Ft Worth, and Austin not think of modular construction as a means to expand their campuses?   The reason is simple:  When large school districts throughout the SW (with the possible exception of California) think of modular construction, they think of temporary, portable buildings.  They do not realize that permanent modular buildings can be built non-combustible, with the same concrete foundations as traditional site constructed buildings, while built to the same model building codes.  Recently, the Modular Building Institute (MBI), the trade association that supports the commercial modular industry, committed to investing both time and money on educating both architects and school districts on the benefits of permanent modular construction. 

This would aid those school districts that are working hard to get within their reduced budgets while providing high quality buildings much faster. Click here to learn more about permanent modular school construction

____________________________________________________________________________________

Mike Slataper is the Founder & Chief Executive Officer of Ramtech Building Systems, Inc.

Earlier we reported that Ramtech recently went back on the road to visit with some of our previous permanent modular building school clients in and around the northern Oklahoma area. We took along our video gear to record the thoughts and comments of our clients now that the completed projects were behind them and they have had a chance to thoroughly evaluate the facilities and reflect back on the experience of working with Ramtech.

Our last stop was to meet with John Lazenby, Superintendent of Glencoe Public Schools in Glencoe, Oklahoma located 80 miles west of Tulsa where Ramtech provided the District with a new elementary school. Purchased through the Texas Buyboard cooperative purchasing network and built using Ramtech’s Accelerated Building System permanent modular construction method, the 6,272 square foot six-classroom facility is part of a rebuilding program to replace some of their original facilities. John was kind enough to give us his thoughts from inside the new building and had this to say about his experience working with Ramtech:

As the Ramtech video tour of northern Oklahoma headed out of Tulsa, we next traveled west one hour to visit Timothy C. Arnold Elementary School, the site of Ramtech’s first Accelerated Building System permanent modular construction project in Oklahoma. (more…)