Bond-funded projects are moving forward at Columbus Municipal School District and meetings are planned to fill the public in on progress in the district.
In a Tuesday board meeting, trustees approved advertising for the first round of work at Cook, Sale and Stokes-Beard elementary schools.
“We’ll receive bids in April,” Jose Arellano, principal architect with the Pryor Morrow architectural firm, told the board. “We’re anticipating to start construction this summer on those projects.”
The $36 million bond, which voters approved in May 2024, will cover three phases of improvements across the three elementary schools, Columbus High School and the district’s athletic complex.
Improvements made at Sale and Cook include updated life safety measures and renovations to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. New ceilings and lights are planned for both schools. Sale will also have roofing redone, with the work at that school estimated to cost $5.3 million. Work at Cook is projected to cost $6.3 million.
Bond money is slated to build a new external gymnasium at Stokes-Beard, where the cafeteria currently doubles as the gym. During this phase, work at the school will only include repairs to closets that house air conditioning units. The project is projected to cost a little less than $300,000.
Neel-Schaffer engineer Kevin Stafford also asked the board Tuesday to also approve advertising a repaving project at Columbus High School. The project will be a full-depth asphalt removal and replacement, he said.
“With your approval, we would advertise next week for an April 17 bid,” Stafford said. “That will leave you roughly six weeks to go do contracting so that once students are out – and teachers as well – in early June, the contractor will already be ready to roll in.”
Community meetings
Moving forward with plans to consolidate elementary schools, the district is hosting school and community meetings to keep stakeholders informed on what comes next in the process.
The district’s strategic plan calls the five elementary campuses to be consolidated by grade-span by the 2027-2028 school year. The current magnet program houses pre-K through fifth grade at each elementary campus, and most of those are half capacity.
To make that timeframe, Superintendent Stanley Ellis told the board in January Franklin Academy will close by the 2025-2026 school year, with pre-K through first-grade students going to Stokes-Beard, second-graders to Sale and third through fourth grade to Cook. At the same time, Hunt Intermediate School will reopen to house fifth- and sixth-graders.
Fairview Elementary will close by the 2026-2027 school year. Facilities on that campus and Franklin Academy will eventually be repurposed.
Ellis said he has already started meeting with teachers and staff who are concerned about how their employment could be affected.
“I’ve told people that that’s not something that you have to worry about,” he said during a March 5 city council meeting. “We will need the teachers, with attrition (and) with some of the administrators that are probably going to leave, probably due to retirement, people transferring. That’s not going to affect us a lot of the 2025-2026 (school year) as we transition.”
Ellis also plans to meet with stakeholders in the community through May to discuss the restructuring. The first of four meetings will begin at 5:30 p.m Thursday at Sim Scott Center.
The three other scheduled meetings also begin at 5:30 p.m. The second is April 2 at Townsend Community Center, the third is May 6 at Sandfield Community Center and the fourth is May 13 at East Columbus Gym.
Trustees also elected officers during the meeting. Robert Smith will serve as president, Telisa Young as vice president and Jo Shumake as secretary for the next year.
McRae is a general assignment and education reporter for The Dispatch.
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