As I’m sure you’ve heard, our school has raised money to improve our athletic fields, starting with the soccer field and a new track! I sat down with head of school Tim Lehman to ask him about the process.
Lehman explained that a “groundbreaking” is a ceremony where all of the major contributors come to commence the last stage of the project. The contributors each shovel some dirt to symbolize the beginning of construction, though it may be another week until construction actually starts. This shows the community what we’ve done and it’s a way to acknowledge the people who contributed. Some people who will be attending the groundbreaking include mayor Jeremy Stutzman, construction workers, major donors, and our school’s board members. The groundbreaking is set for May 15 and construction should be completed by the end of October, but many factors could set it back.
I asked Tim how much money this is all costing, to which he answered, “Around $2.25 million.” He also stated that the money comes from fundraising, not a cent of it is from tuition.
The timeline for the project began in 2016 when the school began talking to some key donors about what they had in mind and asking for their opinion on whether or not they could support it. Once they found the project feasible, they then began to talk with key donors to decide the scope of the project so that if it went wrong only a few people knew. After that last step, which Tim called, “the silent phase,” they publicly launched the campaign in 2018 and began fundraising.
The project itself includes safety and accessibility (new sidewalks, fencing, and better accessibility for people with disabilities), and make things just look nicer in general and match the rest of the campus.
This is all very exciting for our community and I’m sure future generations of students will appreciate the nice new fields when the project has finished.