When the Auburn School Department’s Master Facilities Committee convened to formulate a plan for the future of the city’s school buildings, someone must have spiked their Kool-Aid.

The plan, unveiled at a public hearing on Nov. 16, will be delivered to the full School Committee on Dec. 7. It includes a number of alternative scenarios, but only two are being recommend, one of them so expensive and impractical it’s almost guaranteed to provoke voter backlash if adopted.

This scenario, as described in a School Department press release, entails a “Comprehensive Campus that will serve all Pre-K-12 students and the community at-large,” creating “an opportunity for equity, a common student demographic and a variety of settings for learning.” It would mean “selecting a large location and phasing in the building of facilities over the next 15 years.”

Here’s the English translation: All Auburn students would eventually be concentrated in a cluster of school buildings on a single large campus, where kids from different economic strata would mingle, enjoy a comparable physical environment and have access to the variety of educational programs only a mega-facility can offer.

The “community-at-large” pitch is designed to get Auburn voters, even those without school-age children, on board by offering such public-access goodies as a performing arts center. The 15-year phase-in reflects the reality that an undertaking this colossal is too pricey too carry out all at once.

To get some idea of the scale of a campus large enough to accommodate Auburn’s 3,600 students, picture Bates College minus its dormitories, then consider that Bates only has about half that number of students.

Under the Comprehensive Campus plan, existing elementary school buildings – Fairview, Park Avenue, Sherwood Heights, Washburn, East Auburn — would eventually be closed unless already located on the site selected for the Comprehensive Campus. The only potential single site suggested so far has been the Auburn Middle School.

The Comprehensive Campus (perhaps better labeled the “Magic Kingdom”) is so unrealistic, it’s hard to believe it ever got beyond the “let’s throw the idea against the wall and see if it sticks or slides down” stage.

If we were starting from scratch, it might be worth a look-see.

But why should Auburn scrap nearly 500,000  square feet of existing school buildings, four of which have undergone major renovations and/or additions in recent years (Fairview and Sherwood Heights in 1998, East Auburn in 2000 and Washburn in 2001) and one of which, Park Avenue, was just built in 2006?

And why would a municipality stretching over more than 66 square miles want to bus all its students to a central location, eliminating the opportunity for almost all children to walk to school and greatly extending bus routes?

Worse yet, if Auburn Middle School were the selected site, traffic would become a major problem. Getting 3,600 students in and out each day, via a single entrance on an already congested Court Street, would be like sucking a bowling ball through a straw.

If there’s been a carefully thought-out cost-benefit analysis here, it escapes me.

The Master Facilities Committee’s second scenario is closer to reality, though, in my view, still flawed.

It involves a “seven-campus concept.” Edward Little High School would be remodeled and Auburn Middle School expanded to include the 6th grade. Pre-K through 5th graders would attend Fairview, Sherwood Heights, Park Avenue and a new school at a location yet to be determined. Washburn and East Auburn Community Schools would be closed, and Walton would be recycled to house the alternative, adult-education and therapeutic RETC/SOS programs as well as the School Department’s central administrative office.

In fact, the second scenario is not really that new. It’s reminiscent of one generated as part of a draft master plan update issued in December 2005 and fleshed out by a consulting architect at a joint session of the School Committee and City Council on Dec., 10, 2007. The difference in this earlier plan, however, is that, instead of a new elementary school, it envisioned either Washburn or East Auburn being retained and expanded.

Superintendent Katy Grondin has justified closing both Washburn and East Auburn Schools on the grounds that they’re old, small, have combined gyms and cafeterias, and lack either appropriate spaces for art and music or enough room for pre-K programs. .

Maybe a case could be made for eliminating one of the two schools, but not both. Washburn, in particular, has value because of its location. It’s is a true walking school, well situated to service the downtown. A modest expansion could provide the few components it lacks.

Some parts of the second scenario do seem to make sense.

Expanding Auburn Middle School and converting it into a grade 6-8 facility would free up more space at the elementary schools for growing enrollments and special programs (though careful consideration will have to be given to its disciplinary and safety impact on 6th graders). Upgrading and expanding the high school is not only reasonable, it’s long overdue and generally recognized as the highest local school-construction priority.

But, since a high school makeover and middle school expansion could easily cost $40 to $50 million, constructing a brand new elementary school on top of that is pushing the edge of the envelope. In addition to construction costs, site development expenses for a new school could add significantly to the total tab.

A final adverse factor is that the second scenario calls for removing the School Department’s central office from City Hall to Walton. That runs contrary to the rationale for moving the central office from Chamberlin School to City Hall in the first place — to increase its cooperation and coordination with other city departments.

Any school construction master plan must be viewed against the backdrop of finances. Projects receiving state assistance are few and far between (as the School Department discovered when it attempted to secure state funding for an overly ambitious plan to replace Edward Little High School). In all likelihood, therefore, any local school construction will need to be locally bonded.

It would be better, then, to make due with the schools we have, upgrading and expanding them as needed.

Instead of initiating big new construction projects, let’s put our tax dollars into areas where they can have the biggest educational impact – such as merit pay, curriculum development, and expansion of computer applications for learning.

In the last analysis, capable, motivated teachers and a rigorous, innovative curriculum are far more important to improving the quality of a school system than bricks and sticks.