Centaurus High School students taking mechanical and aerospace engineering classes recently moved into an expanded engineering wing that incudes a large classroom, a commercial grade woodshop and a robotics-themed makerspace with plenty of room to work on bigger projects.

With the Lafayette school’s popular engineering program outgrowing its space, the 3,200-square-foot expansion offers opportunities to add classes and assign more complex projects. The new woodshop also freed up space for a dedicated area for biotechnology projects. Altogether, about 600 students, or about 40% of the school’s enrollment, are taking engineering classes.

“Now that we have this expansion, it’s just going to get better and better,” said Centaurus senior Penny Chamberlain, who is planning to study biotechnical or mechanical engineering in college. “Going into college, having these experiences in these college-level courses at Centaurus is just really important.”

The Boulder Valley School District is using money from the $350 million capital construction bond issue approved in 2022 to add spaces to expand its middle and high school career and technical education programs. Two projects in the first phase of construction, the Centaurus engineering addition and a teaching kitchen in the district’s Culinary Center next to the Arapahoe campus, recently opened to students.

“The bond has been a fantastic catalyst for this work,” Career and Technical Education Director Arlie Huffman said.

Planning included identifying a career and technical education focus for each high school, as well as adding and expanding programs at the districtwide Technical Education Center. Renovations at the Technical Education Center are slated to start over winter break and continue through August 2026. The center added a natural resources program this fall and plans to expand its health and medicine program, as well as start an advanced manufacturing program focusing on the quantum industry.

The center’s construction trades students also will get job experience at a new modular factory the city of Boulder is building nearby on 48 acres of the district’s property. The project is a partnership among the city, the school district and Flatirons Habitat for Humanity.

“We want students to have experiences outside our classroom walls,” Huffman said.

At Centaurus, aerospace engineering teacher Laura Armstrong said her students are using the $50,000 worth of VEX Robotics parts stocked in the new makerspace to build propellers, then will move to the woodshop for glider and rocket projects. Finally, they will have the opportunity to design their own aerospace-themed project.

“They can take their projects wherever they want,” Armstrong said. “They could build with wood or robotics. They could use a laser cutter. They have all the resources. They’re able to use a lot of the tools and equipment that they would use in industry. It’s very much preparing them for what they will see after high school.”

The new woodshop includes an industrial grade dust collection system, a large table router, multiple types of saws, two drill presses and two belt sanders.

Craig Hoeltgen, who teaches mechanical engineering, said he wants to use the shop for hands-on applications of the concepts students are learning, as well as to teach skills that include measurement, building, craftsmanship, safety and problem solving. As an added benefit, he said, the shop will encourage creativity.

“Students can express themselves by designing and building personal projects,” he said.

Centaurus senior Risa Connally praised the giant windows in the new spaces, a welcome change from the original classrooms that don’t offer much natural light. The extra space, she added, should reduce the area’s crowded feel and make it easier to find room to work on projects outside of classes.

“There’s not so much stuff crammed into the rooms now,” she said. “It’s nice to have this big space where people can work. There are a lot of engineering students.”

For sophomore Max Gyorffy, who is considering mechanical engineering as a career, the Centaurus classes are an opportunity to gain experience.

“This space really adds a lot of opportunities to create and build,” he said.

The new teaching kitchen is where the district is holding its high school ProStart classes. The district’s ProStart classes, which provide an industry-backed culinary arts and restaurant management curriculum, have space for 16 students in the morning and another 16 in the afternoon.

The teaching kitchen includes professional-grade cooking equipment, a walk-in refrigerator and freezer, multiple prep and cook stations, and multiple monitors to view teacher demonstrations.

“This is really state-of-the-art,” ProStart teacher Amber Graff said. “Everything we could and would want, it’s here.”

Students started by learning to make stocks in the kitchen’s giant stock pots. Last month, they baked 500 cookies for an Arapahoe Campus Halloween party. Other skills they’re learning include making sauces, salad dressings and pizza.

Along with working in the teaching kitchen, students can go down the hall to visit the district’s central kitchen, which prepares meals from scratch, in bulk, for the district’s breakfast and lunch program.

“The things we’re learning here, we can see in action in our professional kitchen,” Graff said.

Students, who started the year learning in a former preschool room while they waited for the teaching kitchen to open, praised the space for its similarities to a restaurant kitchen.

“If you can go to a restaurant with this kind of experience, it’s really going to set you above,” New Vista High junior Jasper Howell said. “I want to get as much cooking experience as I can. I want broad knowledge. We’re really lucky to have this super-nice kitchen.”