Fourth grader Ryan Betcher learns computer skills from Marilyn Lapiska, a computer teacher at Mars Elementary School. Residential growth in the Mars School District has inspired several expansion projects since 1999.

ADAMS TWP — A projected increase in student enrollment resulting from residential growth has created the need for several expansion projects in Mars School District in recent years.

In June 1999, the school board approved construction contracts for renovation of Mars High School and the building of a new primary center in a valley between the then-Adams Elementary School and Mars Home for Youth property.

The board moved on with expansion plans in March 2000, when it announced plans to add onto the middle school at the intersection of Valencia Road and Route 228. In late 2001 and early 2002, the board approved buying two adjacent properties on Route 228 along the Adams-Middlesex township border.

The McMeekin and Imler properties formed 39 acres that is now being graded for the construction of a $9.7 million middle school, which will house grades five and six. Plans for the school were approved in December 2004, but not before significant protest by many residents.

Those against the construction of the school made their views known at a board meeting in February 2005, where all of the residents who spoke opposed the two-story, 24-classroom school. A group representing nearly all teachers at the existing grade six through eight Mars Middle School also opposed the school at the meeting.

The board in February 2002 also approved the addition of a $9.2 million, two-story auditorium on the east side of the high school. The auditorium, which is large enough to house the entire high school's population, was dedicated on Oct. 28, 2002.

The board voted in April 2004 to add six classrooms and a small storage room to the basement of the new auditorium in anticipation of impending enrollment increases at the high school.The summer of 2004 saw the district switch Adams Elementary and the Mars Primary Center. Since the 2004-05 school year, the neighboring schools have been known as Mars Elementary School and Mars Primary Center.In another change, the former Middlesex Elementary building off Browns Hill Road, having been closed down by the district in 2004, became the Mars School District Administration offices.The most recent growth-related action on the part of the school board came in January when board members voted to have the district architectural firm design a comprehensive growth plan for the high school and middle school. The plan, which will detail possible school expansion projects, will be submitted to state Department of Transportation officials in charge of the Route 228 Improvement Plan.The schools figure into the PennDOT project because Route 228 is the main highway past the schools. PennDOT has narrowed alternatives for the road to two: One would expand the current highway and one would place the highway behind the high school.

<b>Address:</b> 545 Route 228, Mars, PA 16046<b>Telephone:</b> 724-625-1518<b>Web site:</b> www.marsk12.pa.us<b>Superintendent:</b> William Pettigrew<b>Enrollment:</b> 2,916<b>Municipalities served:</b> Mars and Valencia boroughs and Middlesex and Adams townships

One of several construction projects undertaken by the Mars School District recently was the expansion of the middle school at the intersection of Route 228 and Valencia Road. Ground for a new $9.7 million middle school, which will house grades five and six, is now being graded.

Mars High School students rehearse for a play recently in the school's new auditorium, which was dedicated in October 2002. The two-story auditorium, which is large enough to accommodate the entire high school population, cost $9.2 million.