The current middle school, set to be shuttered at the beginning of the 2027-28 school year. Contributed / Town of Windham

On Jan. 14, the Windham Town Council unanimously voted to approve the restructuring of the Middle School Repurposing Committee, extending it from two community members to five, adding a code enforcement officer to the committee, and correcting a position title for an existing staff member.

This committee now consists of 12 voting members and eight non-voting members, and seeks to analyze potential new uses for the Windham Middle School. The group will recommend potential uses for the building, as well as perform a review of the structure, evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the current facility and recommend any necessary changes.

The committee was formed because Windham plans to merge its middle school with the one in Raymond, as voted on by residents of both towns in 2023. The combined school will be housed in a new building in Windham, and will begin operations in the 2027-28 school year, leaving the existing Windham and Jordan Small middle schools shuttered. Both Windham and Raymond have established committees regarding uses for the buildings.

Some potential new uses for the building have already surfaced. Town Manager Barry Tibbetts recalled how in 2017, Windham formed a committee to explore the concept of putting in a community center. The committee did a survey of the town, and came up with a list of ideas. Later, once the town started thinking of ideas to repurpose the middle school, it looked at the study and how the space allocations could fit into the middle school building.

Following the initial analysis, it was decided that the town needed a new advisory committee to look at the old school, go out to the public and get more information, and approach repurposing from the perspective of taking something old and making it new again.

Tibbetts said that the building could be divided into two components: one section housing the administrative offices, cafeteria and gym, and the second section encompassing the classrooms. Structurally, the first component was in excellent condition, with all systems up to date and functional and all parts of the building ADA-accessible. However, Tibbetts specifically noted in the second section that the floor would need to be reinforced if there was to be a library on the upper level, while the roof would need to be reinforced in order to meet new life-safety codes.

The town consulted a general contractor to help it through the process of renovating the building to code and what needs to be addressed, Tibbetts said. Alongside the general contractor was an architect who would give the town an idea of what the exterior and square footage of the building look like from a design perspective. Restructuring of the roof is a priority of the design team; Tibbetts said that the gambrel roof, at the center of the building, could easily be leveled without affecting the structural integrity of the building, but there were questions of what to do with the roof. The committee, he said, would come up with designs for the new building.

The first official meeting of the committee took place on Tuesday, Jan. 21. Future meetings will take place at 5 p.m. on every third Tuesday of the month for the remainder of 2025, with a gap during summer break. Tibbetts said he hopes that by December, the committee will have an idea of the building’s future uses, what they would cost, and how they would be funded, with plans for a concrete proposal to be put before the voters in early 2026. The committee will report its progress to the council every few months.