Thursday, September 24, 2009
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Principal Diane Hunsbarger helps cut a ceremonial ribbon alongside students, faculty, school board administrators, consultants and others outside the new Volney Rogers Middle School during its Open House and Ribbon Cutting Ceremony Wednesday evening.
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Eighth grader Taylor Spencer, 14, opens her new locker at Volney Rogers Middle School alongside her siblings Michael Spencer, 10, and Allyson Barnes, 6, during the school's Open House on Wednesday evening.
The new school is the 12th in a 13-school rebuilding program in Youngstown.
By Harold Gwin
YOUNGSTOWN — Volney Rogers Middle School was named after a visionary, “and that’s the direction this school will follow,” vowed Principal Diane Hunsbarger, moments before the ribbon-cutting that officially opened the new building.
She was referring to Volney Rogers, the founder of Mill Creek Park.
“We need to move forward and get our students where they need to be,” Hunsbarger said.
The new school has something that Rogers, born more than 160 years ago, could not have dreamt about.
“This building is fabulous,” with top-notch technology, she told a crowd of more than 100 gathered Wednesday for the opening ceremony.
The new Volney Rogers replaces the original Volney Rogers Junior High School built in 1960 and razed as part of a $190 million, 13-school rebuilding program in the city. The new $10 million building occupies the same site at 2400 S. Schenley Ave. It now houses 311 students in seventh and eighth grades.
Hunsbarger offered an open invitation to the community to come in and visit anytime.
“We can’t do our job without your support,” she said.
“We need to have a renewed sense of pride, both in this building and the surrounding community,” said Anthony Catale, Youngstown Board of Education president.
That’s the only way to turn things around, he said, a reference to the district’s poor academic performance on the state local report card issued last month.
Gary Kasper, representing the Ohio School Facilities Commission which is picking up 80 percent of the $190 million rebuilding program, said the OSFC is “providing opportunities to education for tomorrow.”
It’s not just about putting up structures, he said.
“We provide the opportunity with these new buildings,” he said, explaining that the facilities give children an opportunity to get the education they need to succeed in life.
“I am very excited that we are coming down to the close of our construction projects,” said Superintendent Wendy Webb.
There’s only one more new school being built — Woodrow Wilson Middle School — and the district soon won’t have to move students and staff around to make way for new construction, she said.
That ongoing disruption over the past six years has been a factor in academic performance, Webb has said in the past.
“We’re going to be OK,” she told the crowd. The district has good leadership, good teachers and great students, she said.
Councilman Paul Drennen, D-5th, and Councilwoman Carol Rimedio-Righetti, D-4th, were on hand to present the district with a resolution enacted by city council.
“We will be here for you 100 percent, for the support of the children and the area,” Drennen pledged.
gwin@vindy.com