It’s back to school for many local districts this week. For some elementary students in Bartow County, they will have a brand new school when they head back on Thursday.
Channel 2′s Steve Gehlbach got a look at the new Mission Road Elementary School at a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Tuesday.
The school keeps its name, but it’s expanding to meet the needs of a growing community. The old building was demolished after the 2023-24 school year two months ago.
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Principal Sherrie Hughes says it took blood, sweat, tears and a lot of love to see the new $30 million building finally open.
“I see all of the little touches that we helped pick out and they talked to us about and listened to what we wanted, that was really important too,” Hughes told Gehlbach.
The building has large windows and colorful spaces, all of which are bigger, brighter and better.
You can just ask a student who recently graduated and went to class in nearly 40-year-old building.
“It’s really colorful, it’s really big, I like it a lot. Definitely really pretty,” he said.
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The community and Bartow County School Leaders came together for Monday’s celebration and ceremony. The school will open with around 500 K-5 students, but it can hold up to 800. There’s also room to expand.
“Definitely want to be in a situation where we were somewhat future-proof. I don’t know if can hang our hat on anymore. Because not only are we seeing residential growth here in the Mission Road area, but throughout our whole county,” new Superintendent Clint Terza said.
The media center to the hallways to the classrooms are finished. All that is missing are the kids.
“I cannot wait to see them looking around and seeing all the beautifulness this is.”
The entire district is rapidly growing with around 14,000 students set to go back to school on Thursday.
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