The decision comes after several false alarms in the past year, caused by the current sensors’ susceptibility to hot weather. According to Assistant Principal of Safety Dr. Mycal Hixon, the new fire alarm system is expected to be installed by August 2024.

Though it will need to be modified on a site-by-site basis, the new system will serve as the district-wide standard across all campuses, according to PAUSD Director of Facilities and Construction Eric Holm. With the current fire alarm system, the loss of power in a single building can prevent other buildings’ fire alarms from working.

“Most fire alarms are wired in series, building by building, so when you do work on a building, everything downstream of that building goes offline,” Holm said. “The new system works on building a node model so each building communicates directly with the main control panel. That way, if any building goes offline, all the other buildings can stay online.”

The new alarms will have a greater tolerance for high temperatures. According to Holm, Gunn’s heat and smoke sensors are in buildings’ warm attic spaces, so on hot days, the current sensors have falsely detected fire. The new sensors will have a higher heat index, so these false alarms will occur less frequently.

According to Hixon, the installation will primarily take place on the weekends and after school to minimize disruption of classroom time.

“We’ll make sure that we communicate (with students) because we’re updating and testing (the alarms), and we want to minimize the negative impact of this project on Gunn students,” he said.

Eight vending machines were present on Gunn’s campus before the pandemic but were removed after the school’s closure and subsequent construction projects. Student desires for more convenient food options prompted the return of the vending machines, according to Principal Wendy Stratton. “There were a lot of students who came forward to my office and were like, ‘We’d like to have access to vending machines or food options — especially those of us who (have) an afterschool sport,’” she said. “It took a few months to get that to happen, but it was a student-driven phenomenon.”

Sophomore Griffin Burton has appreciated the machines. “I use (the vending machines) right before first period because my class is right next to (one),” he said. “I also use it during lunch. It’s just nice to grab something.”

According to Burton, however, some students have lost money due to negligence. “If you’re using your credit card, you have to press the ‘complete’ button before you leave,” he said. “Anyone else can use it, so it can keep going and going until someone presses ‘complete.’ There have been times where people accidentally bought things with someone else’s money, then all of a sudden, six or seven dollars go down the drain.”

Child Nutrition Administrator Alva Spence noted that the district plans to add one more snack and one more beverage machine to Gunn’s campus — the machines have been ordered and will be placed near the end of September.

According to bond program director Tom Hodges, who oversees construction, different tasks are all in various stages of completion. “So far, we’ve completed the demolition of the A and B buildings, including all the concrete and structures that surround the two buildings, and we’ve been working on underground utilities inside A and B, like plumbing and electrical work,” he said. According to Hodges, the next step of construction is the seismic retrofitting—or structurally strengthening buildings with new wood and columns to prevent earthquake damage—of the buildings. “We’ll also be leveling out of the site for the new additions to those new buildings, then we’ll be working on some more site utilities outside A and B as well,” Hodges said.

The project, which started on Oct. 24, 2022, was originally scheduled to be completed by  Jun. 30, 2024. However, the extreme weather that hit California is delaying completion. “We’re probably about a month late, but it’s still early in the project, so we’re hoping to make some time up when the weather starts to improve,” Hodges said. “We’ve been finding things both in the building and around the site that we weren’t anticipating, so we’re doing a lot of rework with our design team to make adjustments for all these unforeseen conditions.”

One of those unforeseen conditions is a surprise in the location of a water line, which the construction team discovered was in a different location than originally shown. “It’s about 20 feet away from where we were shown in the drawings, so we’re gonna have to relocate that water line, which we can’t do during school because it’ll affect all the bathrooms on campus,” Hodges said. According to Hodges, the issue will be resolved during the next long weekend.

The demolition has also forced the administration to temporarily relocate to the E building. According to the principal’s secretary Martha Elderon, the change has gone very well. “It’s made it easier to communicate with each other because it’s a smaller area, so we can talk to each other without having to walk down the hall to see each other,” she said.

However, the change in location has made it much more difficult for visitors to get around campus. “ It’s harder for them because they have to walk further to get their parking passes and then walk back to their cars,” Elderon said. “We did what we could with the signage and directions, but it’s just very hard to find us.”

Social studies teacher Chris Johnson has had to endure the occasional loud noises from the construction site. “There were days early on where it seemed like there was noise all the time,” he said. “It was just constant noise.”

According to Hodges, the sound comes from the machine that they use when removing old foundations or concrete. “We still have some concrete columns that we have to remove in the near future, so (the sounds are) not done yet,” he said.  

While the title “computer support specialist” suggests a rather narrow responsibility, Munoz deals with more than just computers. “We also help students and staff with any other technological needs like the printers and the Apple TVs,” he said. “We do setups, too. If there’s an event that needs speakers or microphones, we’ll do that, and we’ll make sure that all the tech is set up for that event.”

Ever since his childhood, Munoz has been interested in technology and had always considered going into the field. “I grew up playing video games, learning about computers, building computers and doing stuff like that,” he said. “I grew up with technology, which is why I’m so passionate about it.”

After spending five months earning an Information Technology certification, Munoz began working at Gunn. “I feel like the certification really taught me more than I really needed when it came to the position,” he said. “It’s awesome, because, at the end of the day, it’s much better to be prepared than sorry.”

The problem-solving aspect of the job is what Munoz enjoys the most and is why he finds his work so fulfilling. Once, he dealt with an issue with some of the L-5 computers, which were all struggling to run a certain application. “Those computers are really old and they have some issues where you really have to dig deep to find out what the problem is,” he said. “But pretty much after looking into it for a week or two, I finally found a way to get the application running. That was definitely a really cool moment, because it was stressing me out for a bit, but it was really rewarding when I finally found a way to fix it.”