Multimillion-dollar renovation projects under way at Columbia and Southwest DeKalb high schools are bringing improvements and expansions to the decades-old buildings.

Columbia High's $9.5 million renovations will get them an auditorium and Career Technology Center. Construction, which began April 18, will be in two phases. It is slated for completion in August 2008.

Phase I will cost nearly $5.5 million. The 11,500-square-foot auditorium is scheduled for completion in November 2006. The Career Technology Center should be completed by the end of March 2007.

The auditorium will seat 500 for concerts, art performances and other extracurricular activities. The Career Technology Center will span more than 10,500 square feet of new and renovated space. It will house the new administrative wing as well as an information technology lab, professional foods lab and a health professionals lab.

Phase II, which costs $4 million, will include upgrades of the HVAC, and installation of new ceilings and lights throughout the remainder of the facility.

Enrollment at Columbia High has grown steadily over the past five years and students are now attending classes in 13 trailers. No new classrooms are included in the construction project and officials plan to deal with the overcrowding by redrawing attendance lines for Columbia and Cedar Grove High Schools beginning 2006-2007 school year.

Final phase at SWD

Phase IV of Southwest DeKalb's two-year renovations project began on April 7 and is slated to be completed Aug. 1. The latest round of construction will upgrade the gym, locker, chorus and orchestra rooms at the 40-year-old school. Students are being bused off campus for their physical education classes. The girls and boys track teams and spring football camps are practising at Panthersville Stadium for the remainder of the season.

School officials said the $3.4 million project will not impede the band and orchestra programs but off-site storage for uniforms and instruments have to be found.

The renovations at Southwest DeKalb have been under way since July 2004. Teachers and students returned to the building in January, after spending 18 months in trailers while classrooms were being renovated. Parents are upset that the school system opted to begin the final phase of construction during the school year instead of waiting for summer when students do not use the facilities. Tracy McMeen, the Southwest DeKalb PTA president, said that she is opposed to students being displaced again.

"They don't need to tear the school up again while our kids are still in it," she said. All special spring events, which include graduation practices, academic awards banquet, the spring concert, the band banquet, the senior assembly and the ROTC banquet will now be held off-campus.