Harker Middle School
San Jose, California
AWCI Member Contractor: J&J Acoustics
The following project was submitted to AWCI’s Excellence in Construction Quality Awards program in 2022 in the Steel Framing category.
Harker Middle School is a non-profit, private K-12 school in Silicon Valley that has earned international recognition for its top academics, quality teachers and students’ achievements. Founded in 1893, Harker is the largest independent school of its kind in California, with a dedicated campus for each of its divisions—elementary school, middle school and upper school—in San Jose. With the addition of a state-of-the-art central classroom and gymnasium/multipurpose building Harker School will continue to be an education leader.
This construction project featured the removal of five existing “pod” buildings that were replaced with a new 40,000-square-foot, two-story academic building along with the remodel of the school’s existing 9,000-square-foot gymnasium.
AWCI member J&J Acoustics performed the steel-framing work on both buildings as a design-build with their partners at Devco engineering. The academic building was heavy-gauge metal stud framed with exterior Dens Glass sheathing for the exterior. It had multiple large storefront openings around the perimeter as well as a clerestory. The gymnasium also had heavy gauge studs to support basketball hoops, windows and seating.
On both levels of the academic building, J&J crews had to build spandrel headers to make the window ROs work since they were so close to the I-beams. In the auditorium J&J built a complete stage, including stairs, out of metal stud framing.
In all, the steel framing materials used on this project, which was started June 1, 2020, and completed Sept. 30, 2021, included 124,318 linear feet of non-load-bearing studs; 41,543 linear feet of non-load-bearing track; 2,073 linear feet of load-bearing studs and 1,221 feet of load-bearing track.
J&J Acoustics, Inc. has been serving the Santa Clara Valley and San Francisco Bay area for over 40 years with roughly 350 union employees and 40 office staff specializing in metal studs, drywall, taping, lath and plaster. Visit jjacoustics.com to learn more about this AWCI member’s company and work.
