Case Ave. Elementary in Sharon to be rebuilt

Staff report

SHARON, Pa.

It’s going to be out with the old Case Avenue Elementary School and in with the new one.

After the 88-year-old building — once a high school that now houses pre-kindergarten through the sixth grade — is demolished and the debris hauled away, a new building will be built on the same spot.

John Sarandrea, Sharon schools superintendent, said the name will not change, and the building will still house the same grades.

One change will be the school’s size. The old one, which is 150,000 square feet, is too big, Sarandrea said last week. The new one will be 95,000 square feet.

The old building, Saran-drea said, is not energy-efficient. It isn’t accessible for people with disabilities, and its electrical and plumbing systems are failing, he said.

It will be torn down this summer after asbestos is removed. He doesn’t know how long that will take, he said.

Brenda Pickup, who has taught at Sharon schools for 39 years, said it’s sad to see the old school go, but “it’s time.”

Pickup, who graduated from the school when it was a high school in 1968, said she is retiring at the end of the school year.

“So I and Case Avenue will end together,” she said.

It would have been interesting to teach in the new school, said Pickup, who teaches Title I reading and math but also has taught fourth and sixth grades in the district.

She would like to have been there, she said.

“It’s sort of fate,” she added.

The entire school project is estimated to cost between $18 million and $22 million, Sarandrea said.

Of that money, $15 million is coming from an interest-free loan of federal dollars, he said.

He said the district is hoping bids come in low.

“It’s an interesting time to build,” he said. “There’s not a lot of construction going on, and people are hungry for work.”

He said the building is expected to be finished in two years. He said it will have “a nice landscape and a residential feel” to blend in with a nearby church and surrounding houses.

The main entrance will no longer be on Case Avenue; it will be on Linden Street, he added.