For years, students have always wondered about the building across the street from the school. It is within the school grounds, but few have discovered what it is actually used for.

Sideburn Support Center was built 40 years ago as a food and book storage warehouse, but now is an office building for all the maintenance workers in the county. They check into the office every day and are assigned a daily job in different parts of the county by the supervisor.

The inside of the building appears office-like, while the back looks more like a warehouse, with different equipment and trucks for workers. The faculty in this building takes care of all FCPS facilities.

There are over 200 similar buildings for maintenance in the county and the maintenance organization has approximately 468 people. They have four other buildings, called satellites, in Edison High School, a leased space in Herndon, Woodson High School and the North East satellite; these run independently and are responsible for the Tyson’s Corner area.

“It helps that they are right across the street and with the recent flood in the middle school, it was helpful for them to be that close,” administrative services principal Bill Evers said.

Sideburn Support Center was built across the street because the land was available.

The building has a staff development program, so the building also features a training room. Officials train all new custodians preparing to work at all Fairfax County schools.

Director of facilities management, Steve Vollmer said, “When Robinson has maintenance needs, we can respond very quickly.”