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KEOKUK, IOWA -- Progress is coming along with the $14 million dollar renovation and expansion project the Keokuk School District is undertaking.

The major project includes six new classrooms at Hawthorne Elementary and a major renovation at Keokuk High School.

The Hawthorne classrooms should be finished by the end of January and the projects at the high school will be finished in just over a year.

Renovations at Keokuk High School include new windows, a new geo thermal heating and cooling system and the field house will be gutted and redone. That project will also include air conditioning for the facility.

Total costs for the high school project is about $11 million while the classroom project at Hawthorne is about $3 million.

The projects are being paid for through the state wide sales tax that every school district across Iowa shares and gets money for major projects and purchases.

" We did a major project at the high school back in the 1990's and we decided that the building needed a major facelift. As for the extra classrooms at Hawthorne, that's part of our overall realignment of grades K through six. That will save us several thousand dollars a year," said Keokuk School Superintendent Dr. Lora Wolff.