Groundbreaking held for new Turner County Middle and High School
ASHUBURN, Ga. (WALB) - Turner County broke ground on its brand on the new site of the future Turner County Middle and High School. It’s going to take a few years to build, but as WALB reports, students and parents will definitely feel the upgrades.
It is the start of a three year process where the new school will have updated facilities, new technology and all around a better learning environment for the students. It’s expected to be completed by May 18, 2026.
“Being that I am a Turner County native and an alumni of 2005, I am very honored to be selected as the architect. And I’m very proud to see my vision come to life and I’m hopeful the community will be just as proud of this vision as well,” said Kyle Wilkerson, vice president of Altman+Barrett Architects.
Craig Matthews superintendent of Turner County Schools reiterates that excellence is driven by success in the community.
“Today is a special day in history of Turner County. We are building a new school that will serve a generations of students and will shape their future. An investment in our students is an investment in the future of our community. Our vision statement is Excellence in Education,” said Matthews.
This project is state-funded, and Turner County is considered a low-wealth project, meaning they will pay 50% of it, and the other with local taxpayer dollars.
“We would also like to thank our CFO and Assistant Superintendent Liz Walker for her hard work on the finance end of this project,” said Sandra Blue, Turner County Board of Education Board chairman.
“When he shared with me what was going to take place, I was honored. So I showed up today to give my support to him, the school, the school board. Just to let the students know that we are thinking about them. We are concerned about their safety. Their learning to actually build this new school into an academy,” said Christopher R. Douglas, vice president Of Ministerial Alliance.
One goal that the new school hopes to achieve is to become a College and Career Academy grant recipient. Currently, they are selected as a finalist and hopes to move forward in the process.
“That grant will give us another $3 million in state funding that will save local taxpayers money. So we are looking forward to that, and we invite everyone from the community to join us in this process,” said Matthews.
The new two-story, 6th-grade through 12th-grade facility will house all new instructional units, administrative offices, a media center and a gymnasium.
“Altman+Barrett Architects always starts every project off with meeting with the school and the staff to see what their needs are, how schools are ran every single day. So we hold a week-long session with all the school members, and we go back to the drawing board and implement every single thing that they mentioned every single day,” said Wilkerson.
The school superintendent says now is the time to dig into the needs of the community.
“The term the time is now for us to build this project. And we use that because the old building is failing us and showing its age a little bit. Building a new school was going to be less cost for local citizens than it would be to renovate an old one,” said Matthews.
“The warmth of the new school and everything will bring everything back together and kids will want to learn and teachers will want to teach,” said Douglas.
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