The Performing Arts Center is a Bond Measure AA project set to begin construction after the Jan. 30 groundbreaking performance event, which featured choir and marching band, theater teacher Kaila Schwartz said. The construction is set to be completed by fall 2025 and will be located in what used to be the teacher’s parking lot, she added.
The contract for the Performing Arts Center and a second gymnasium was signed at the end of 2019, according to the bond master schedule on the MUSD website. After the funding source was finalized, Schwartz, music teacher Emily Moore, assistant vice principal Jennifer Hutchinson, and former principal Francis Rojas began meeting architects and discussing designs throughout 2020, she said.
“There’s a whole music wing; the theater is going to be beautiful,” Schwartz said. “There’s going to be a black box, which is an additional space that I’ll be able to use as my classroom so we can have daytime assemblies without displacing anybody. And, there will be a (scene) shop so we can build our sets in a place that is designed for building sets and not on the stage.”
Band director Chris Hoefflinger, who is currently located in room D4, Moore, who is currently located in D2, and Schwartz, who is currently located in P10 and D1, the main stage area, will have their own classrooms within the center, Schwartz said. There will be a lobby, bathrooms, and concession booths inside the building, in addition to indoor and outdoor ticket booths, she added.
“There will be an exclusive band orchestra room and a choir room and instruments storage (and) music storage,” Schwartz said. “Then the sound won’t bleed. (…) I’m excited, because this will also enable us to have different kinds of performances and different kinds of arts events because the lobby can become a performance base or a showcase art gallery. There are a lot of possible uses for the space.”
The theater, which is currently used for band, choir, and theater performances, is not serving the music and theater departments’ needs, Schwartz said.
“Our equipment is old, outdated, and not in great shape,” Schwartz said. “You can look around this theater and there are broken seats; the lighting is old. I had contacted a company about fixing a couple of things that are problematic with our system and they looked at it and they said, ‘You need a complete overhaul.’”
The theater stage has inadequate space for the orchestra, which makes concerts crowded and uncomfortable, Schwartz said.
Freshman Elyanna Andres, who performs in marching band, jazz band, and concert band, feels that the space is old and “musty,” Andres said.
”I feel like everything now is kind of compressed, so everyone’s pretty tight together,” Andres said. “The new room will allow for a lot more space.”
Andres hopes that the building will increase student’s participation in the arts, she said.
“I think it’s going to allow for a lot of students to express their art a lot better,” Andres said. “It may also be motivation for other students that were interested to go (…) It’s like, ‘Oh, this new building is cool. Let’s go see. How do I get there?’”
The Performing Arts Center could also be used to host board meetings and presentations, Hoefflinger said. MHS could also rent it out to other schools, he added.
“This is the first kind of Performing Arts Center to be truly built for the people of Milpitas,” Hoefflinger said. “(The building is) to again have a celebration of music, theater, musicals, everything. And that’s going to be really vital to truly have a kind of anchor in the community.”