By Jon Minners
For Christopher Columbus High School, $3.5 million goes a long way, as Councilman Jimmy Vacca discovered when he toured his alma mater last Thursday, February 28, to celebrate the vast changes he helped make possible.
The City Council funding ? allocated by Vacca for use by the nonprofit school-support organization New Visions for Public Schools ? has already enabled Columbus to replace the lighting, curtains, seats and windows in its auditorium, and conduct a wholesale upgrade of its cafeteria, with newly painted walls, newly installed flooring, and innovative seating arrangements that include circular benches and booth areas to provide comfort, privacy and an overall warm and welcoming atmosphere uncommon in school cafeterias.
Vacca stood stunned as he looked at the diner-like facility he once ate lunch at as a teenager and now feeds students from Columbus and four smaller schools: Astor Collegiate Academy, the Columbus Institute for Math and Science, the Global Enterprise Academy, and the Pelham Preparatory Academy.
