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After seven years of construction, temporary classrooms and shifting teachers between buildings, when Mountain View High School students returned on Monday for the first day of school, all of the campus’s permanent classrooms were back in use – and, for the first time in years, no teachers sharing a room.
The change came as the district wrapped up renovations to the school’s 300 and 400 wings, the latest phase of a broader bond-funded construction program that has reshaped much of the campus.
At an Aug. 3 school board meeting, Principal Kip Glazer said teachers were especially excited to have spaces they could make their own. “I think there is some pride in being able to decorate your wall and not having to share with somebody else,” Glazer said.
The milestone does not come from adding classrooms in the newly completed wings. Instead, it marks the end of a yearslong shuffle in which permanent classrooms were periodically taken out of service for construction and teachers were moved into temporary portable buildings or shared spaces.
Teachers have been rotating through temporary classrooms since construction began in 2019, according to Mike Mathiesen, the Mountain View Los Altos High School District’s associate superintendent of business services. As one section of campus was completed, teachers would move back in while another group moved out as the next section was renovated.
Years of Measure E construction
The work is being paid for by Measure E, a $295 million bond approved by voters in 2018. Previous Measure E projects at Mountain View High have included a new two-story classroom building and engineering wing, an auxiliary gym, a student services and administration building and an additional synthetic turf field.
Measure E also funded extensive work at Los Altos High, where plans included a music building addition and renovations to the kitchen and cafeteria, in addition to classroom, student services and athletic projects similar to those undertaken at Mountain View High.
The latest work, completed this summer, focused on modernizing older classroom wings on campus. Across the 100, 200, 300 and 400 wings, 24 of 40 classrooms were expanded by enclosing covered breezeways between groups of rooms, increasing them from roughly 700 square feet to be closer to the state’s 960-square-foot classroom guideline.The remaining 16 classrooms are at the ends of the four wings, where the building layout made expansion less practical, Mathiesen said. The district also wanted to preserve some walkways through campus. Smaller classrooms can still work well for courses with fewer students, he added.
Beyond gaining floor space, the classrooms received new roofs, heating and air conditioning systems, lighting, electronic locking systems, doors and other upgrades. Old single-pane windows were replaced with double-pane windows, and the district added accessible walkways, landscaping and outdoor seating.
“There’s more space for students to spread out, for teachers to walk around,” Mathiesen said.
Back in 2024, the school board approved spending $27.75 million to enlarge the 24 classrooms in the 100- through 400-wings at Mountain View High. According to Mathiesen, the district is on track to stay within that budget.
However, the current budget is far above the $7.4 million to $8.14 million that the district originally expected to spend on the project back in 2018. Since that time, the project plans got more detailed, new state requirements were added and construction costs spiked, district officials said.
The district is now preparing to modernize Mountain View High’s main and small gyms, along with a workout space and portions of the quad. The district is awaiting approval from the state Division of the State Architect and hopes to award construction bids at an Aug. 17 board meeting, Mathiesen said. Work at Mountain View High is expected to continue through next summer, followed by a similar gym renovation at Los Altos High during the 2027-28 school year. The gym renovations are expected to be the final projects in the Measure E program.