Oakwood School District officials broke ground on an addition to Oakwood Grade School Wednesday night.
Using ESSER (Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief) funds and $3 million in working cash bonds, the Oakwood community will move their junior high students from the current facility located north of the village into town.
“We were able to get approval from the state to utilize those funds to help our situation with our junior high, which is a very old building where we cannot improve the air quality,” Superintendent Larry Maynard said.
“We’ve been talking about this scenario of moving the junior high here for years. So this was the perfect opportunity to actually use federal dollars for construction for something that would benefit our kids from a learning standpoint.”
The addition will bring an additional 15,000 overall sq. ft. to Oakwood Grade School, including 11,000 sq. ft. of classroom space, 11 new classrooms in total, with additional space being filled with a band room, a new secure entrance for the junior high, and a new set of restrooms.
“I think for us, it’s going to be a great opportunity to have those students back closer to the community,” Board President Randy Smith said. “It’s going to be just a beautiful addition to school. It’s going to be a great place to teach and to learn.
“This new addition is going to have a lot of amenities and a lot of chances for students to have a better opportunity.”
The existing Junior High building will be closed (except for the use of the gym as necessary), allowing the existing, aged building systems to be shut down.
It is projected that this project will save the district $6.8 million over a 20-year period, not including the potential sale of the Oakwood Junior High Building.
Both the board and staff at Oakwood realized that the limitations of the Oakwood Junior High Building negatively impacted students during the COVID-19 pandemic. With limited internet access due to its remote location, Maynard said that having Pre-K through 8th-grade students on one campus within Village limits will help to improve the district’s infrastructure.
Teachers will also benefit from the opportunities that come with sharing resources on one campus.
“We just felt like it was the right time to do some things that would help us out financially and have a long-term benefit for our kids and our community, moving us forward with our strategic plan,” Maynard said.
The next steps of that plan may include improvements to Oakwood High School.
Maynard said those discussions are to come, as are decisions with what to do with the Oakwood Junior High property and junior high athletic facilities.
The district is also taking advantage of Preschool for All Expansion Grants to renovate Oakwood Grade School’s playground.
With new equipment and ground cover, the playground will also have a courtyard and options for special education students.
“That way they would have an opportunity to be included with play,” Maynard said. “We’re pretty excited about all that.”
The district will also build a track along the west side of the school for students who are wheelchair-bound. Currently, they have to go through gravel and grass to get to the playground, but a paved path will give easier access.
The district chose AMERESCO to complete the project. Construction is expected to be completed by the summer of 2022.
