With just 560 students in grades 6-12, arranged in distinct middle and high school wings, the new Tahanto Regional Middle/High School offers students the benefits of small school education while also supporting fuller shared-use amenities than would have been possible for the communities to provide had the schools been fully separate. In the new Tahanto, shared public spaces, including a double-height dining commons, library, theater, music suite, and gymnasium, unite the entire school along a community "main street," while classrooms have been divided into smaller scale middle and high school wings, each with its own discrete entrance on either side of the shared main administration suite.

The new school responds gracefully to its heavily forested, environmentally sensitive site on the Wachusett Reservoir by incorporating earth-tone cladding and wood into its exterior. The school was also designed to MA-CHPS sustainability standards and sited to optimize views, incorporating extensive daylighting throughout, as well as solar screens, solar shading, and clerestory windows. Athletic fields for track, soccer, softball, baseball, and field hockey are placed at the far edges of the site in response to the sensitive wetlands and buffer zones that dominate the site.