The favorite features listed by staff members and visitors Wednesday at the new Bobby G. Lester Elementary School in the Jacksonville/North Pulaski School District included large colorful classrooms, ergonomic furnishings, "giant" electronic white boards and classroom water fountains.
Janice Walker, principal of the new school, which will open Monday, the first day of classes, to about 500 kindergarten-through-fifth-graders, said the school's focus will be on building a strong foundation in literacy and, because of that, she likes the centrally located, glassed-in library/media center.
"It's the heart of the school," Walker said. "And when children walk in ... their eyes will land on that media center that is filled with lots of books."
The Lester school is opening at a time when school construction is rampant in Pulaski County. In addition to three charter school campuses that are new this year, there are two new schools opening in the Pulaski County Special School District this year. Jacksonville and the Little Rock district have new high schools under construction for opening in the near future.
The 80,000-square-foot, $15.3 million Lester Elementary replaces both Arnold Drive and Tolleson elementaries. The new building's additional features include a gymnasium/safe room, a glass walled cafeteria with a curtained stage, and a teaching courtyard with an artificially turfed play area, as well as up-to-date technology systems.
"This building is so beautiful," Bobby Lester, the longtime educator and now retired superintendent for whom the school is named, said Wednesday.
Lester was the chief executive of the Pulaski County Special School District for 15 years and then came out of a 16-year retirement in 2014 to be the first superintendent -- on an interim basis -- for the Jacksonville/North Pulaski system. The system at that time was newly recognized by the state as separate from the Pulaski County Special district.
The new district operated under the direction of the Pulaski County Special district until July 2016 when the detachment went into full effect -- by then under the direction of Superintendent Tony Wood.
Bryan Duffie is now the Jacksonville/North Pulaski superintendent after Wood's retirement in June 2017.
Jacksonville area residents had long sought the establishment of their own district in large part to be able to update the old campuses.
Duffie said Lester Elementary is the first new traditional public school in the Jacksonville area in 37 years or since the opening of Murrell Taylor Elementary. The district is currently building a second new school -- Jacksonville High -- that will open next August. That will be followed with a new middle school building and ultimately replacement of other elementary schools.
This first new elementary campus is symbolic of the great effort made by the whole Jacksonville community to establish its own school system, Lester said Wednesday to more than 200 family members, friends, former co-workers and school employees on hand to mark the completion of the building at 605 Harris Road.
"It's just a great district, and we plan on becoming better and better," Lester said. "We want to change the whole culture of the district to become the best in the nation."
Lester lightheartedly called out one of his own favorite features of the building -- the red metal panels that trim the neutral brick exterior. They are an unexpected acknowledgement, he said, to his well-known devotion to the University of Arkansas Razorbacks athletic teams.
Sheryl Boyd, chairman of the Jacksonville Chamber of Commerce, said the improvements in the Jacksonville area school system bode well for the city.
"I really think that the school district is what is going to change the business district here in Jacksonville," Boyd said.
Ron McDaniel, president of the Jacksonville/North Pulaski School Board said the board is "trying to get this school district down the track toward quality education for the young people who are in our district and also to get us out of federal court."
As a condition of the detachment, the Jacksonville/North Pulaski district must meet the same school desegregation obligations as the Pulaski County Special district in that district's 35-year-old federal school desegregation lawsuit.
Those requirements include equalizing the condition of the district's aged school buildings, which are often in communities with high populations of black students, with those newer buildings in the Pulaski County Special district that are in predominantly white neighborhoods.
Walker, the principal, and fourth-grade math teacher Jennifer Simpson say the staff at the new school -- some from Arnold Drive Elementary and others from Tolleson Elementary -- have prepared for their work in the new setting.
Walker said the Lester staff members have taken opportunities such as a retreat on Mount Magazine to not only review student data as a preparation for instruction but also went through team-building exercises.
Simpson, who previously taught at the very small but high achieving Arnold Drive Elementary said there is always pressure to raise student achievement.
"But we have a very supportive administration," Simpson said, and we have melded into one big family."
Metro on 08/09/2018