Superintendent Howell talks Highland, other School District 25 projects during chamber breakfast

POCATELLO — School District 25 Superintendent Doug Howell on Thursday spoke during a Pocatello-Chubbuck Chamber of Commerce breakfast and detailed the district’s various projects throughout the Gate City area.

Following a generous breakfast held at the Idaho State University Idaho Central Credit Union Bengal Alumni Center and an introduction from district spokesperson Courtney Fisher, Howell addressed an audience of nearly 100 guests, detailing the mission of the school district and providing updates to projects across the city.

“We come to the chamber, we get out to all the community organizations and talk to all of you about our needs and what we can do to improve all conditions of life,” Howell said. “Everything comes back to education. It’s the heart and soul of what we do.”

Howell presented a slideshow that showcased the various improvements to School District 25 schools, first mentioning the expansion at Pocatello High School provided by capital improvement funding that created a breezeway, nine classrooms and a modernized science wing. Howell also credited Lookout Credit Union for its support in helping build the Pocatello Thunder and Hawthorne fields.

Moving onto the Highland rebuild, Howell spoke on the completion of its field last year and touched on the remodel of the Highland baseball field.

“Another reason this benefits our communities is because we’re able to host other school districts, we’re able to host statewide events,” Howell said. “When we bring that in, it brings business to your business, and we love being a part of that partnership.”

Howell gave updates to the Century High School field that is currently under construction and plans are still moving forward toward a home opener on Sept. 9.

The Portneuf Valley Technical Education Career Campus, also known as PV-Tech, is also nearing completion and a few pictures and pieces of concept art were shared with attendees. The PV-Tech center reimagines the site of the former Allstate building, which the district purchased in 2022.

Since that time, considerable work was done adding heating, air conditioning and ventilation along with classrooms, a gym, a cafeteria, industrial spaces and garage bay door access for the first responder academy that includes emergency medical responders, firefighters and law enforcement.

Around 24 career technical programs will be available from the PV-Tech program and students of this facility will be able to utilize a portion of the 100,000 square feet of space available on site to earn their associate degrees. The building is currently the fifth largest building in the district.

Final touches are still being worked on, but the PV-Tech facility will be ready for its grand opening on Oct. 3.

In an exciting update for the Highland rebuild and the new facilities that will be coming in the next years, Howell shared conceptual designs that showcased what the school might look like when everything is completed.

“We’re looking at an about 800- to 856-seat theater,” Howell said. “We’ve relocated our music programs, our drama, they will all be on that north side. Then you can see down through the centers, the commons, we’ll have a little bit of a courtyard area out to the east, and then our kitchen, locker rooms and gym. The gym will actually have a second floor.”

Additional classrooms will be added to a portion of these new buildings along with various activity areas.

Howell went into more detail during each of the slides, illustrating a robust number of details already being considered in the concept art and potential architectural designs. If everything shown that morning could be implemented, Highland would be heavily transformed with many modernizations and features that would make it one of the premier high schools in the state.

“I want to create opportunities for everyone and I want to be more together,” Howell said in a closing remark. “Because of the community we have huge opportunity right now. The future is young people. It’s the heart and soul of what we do — education for all the future.”