District breaking ground for second new school
It doesn’t even have a name yet, but there will be a groundbreaking ceremony Thursday for Elementary School No. 9, one of four elementary schools being built or remodeled to relieve overcrowding in the Peninsula School District.
School No. 9 will be built at 10811 Harbor Hill Drive, across from the current YMCA building.
“We are going to do a little ceremony that turns some soil and rocks over, and the next few weeks there will be some exciting work to get that site prepped for construction,” said David Brooks, the principal at school No. 9.
The ceremony was set for 11 a.m. Thursday, Feb. 27
Set to open in Fall of 2021, the new school will add 30 classrooms to a district that has been overflowing into portables at the eight existing elementary schools.
“it’s something the community has really needed for quite some time in terms of addressing the growth in Gig Harbor,” Brooks said.
School No. 9 is part a construction spurt authorized by a $198 million bond passed in February of 2019. It’s a companion to Pioneer Elementary, once known as School No. 10, which is being build on the site of the former Gig Harbor Boys and Girls Club.
Between them, the schools will hold over 550 students each.
In addition, two more schools, Artondale Elementary and Evergreen Elementary, are to be replaced by new schools to be built on the existing sites.
Last year Gig Harbor’s quickly growing district saw 66 portables being used to house elementary students. What’s more, the district had 704 new kindergarten students registered this year, a record by over 80 students.
“Having space other than portables to put our kids in for a learning environment, and knowing we will have four new schools in the next two years or so, it’s really exciting for the community,” Brooks said.
Whereas Pioneer Elementary will be pulling in students from across the district, School #9 will bring in the children who live in Gig Harbor North.
“For Number 9, the community is in a densely populated area,” Brooks said. “It will be a small geographic footprint, but a tight local community, which is exciting for me to know it will have its network of neighbors.”
Brooks, who was the Discovery Elementary School principal for ten years, said many kindergarten to second grade students at Discovery will become third-to-fifth grade students at this new school.
“I know some of the families starting at the new school,” Brooks said.
Construction will begin shortly after the groundbreaking ceremony, Brooks said. The architect is Integrus Architecture.
According to the Peninsula School District website, a name for the school will be coming soon.
This story was originally published February 25, 2020 at 12:00 AM.