Enthusiasm high for opening of new school
K-2 facility to hold 600 students come start of school Sept. 6
BY JOHN DUNPHY
Staff Writer

JEFF GRANIT staff South River Superintendent of Schools Ronald Grygo shows off the media center/library of the borough’s new K-2 primary school on Johnson Place in South River.

Not to scare the little ones, but school’s less than a month away.For many, the beginning of the new school year means new clothes, new textbooks and having to wake up early for the first time in almost three months.

But for many South River children, this school year also brings a brand-new school. The Board of Education will open the new K-2 South River Primary School at the corner of Johnson Place and David Street with the start of school Sept. 6.

JEFF GRANIT staff Superintendent of Schools Ronald Grygo looks over one of the kindergarten classrooms at the new primary school earlier this week.

The 58,350-square-foot facility, whose $11.9 million price tag was approved by voters in 2003, is the second school to be built in the borough in the past eight years. The South River Elementary School, located one block away, was built in 1997.

Superintendent of Schools Ronald Grygo said the new primary school will house about 600 students next month, helping to alleviate the already overcrowded elementary school. He noted that it will also help ease the often difficult parking situation at the other site, where the district’s middle and high schools are also located.

“This school and its parking lot ought to alleviate the parking problem,” Grygo said. “I think the staff and students will be very pleased.”

With a student body averaging 5 to 7 years of age, the building has been designed with a number of amenities that will better serve younger children, the superintendent said.

The entire building is air conditioned, ample storage rooms for teacher supplies can be found throughout the building, and televisions, DVD players and computers are in just about every classroom.

Many of the lights in the building are sensor-activated, so if a child wanders into a hallway that has not been in use, its lights will automatically come on.

“Unless the youngster knows where the lights are, it could be a problem,” Grygo said. “This building is built with optimal instructional focus as well as optimal safety focus.”

Color schemes have also been incorporated that are more conducive to educating younger children. In the nurse’s office, white tones are offset by bright blue notes. Throughout the halls, maroons and grays are used to “give it some South River identity,” Grygo said.

“I really like the way it’s been designed. The colors are very uplifting and bright,” he added.

Also interesting, Grygo noted, is the building’s architecture and the fact that not every corner is at a 45-degree angle.

A muted skylight brightens the building’s media center and library, which makes use of many different angles to fit in as many books and computers as possible.

Grygo said the innovative architecture was used in part because of a limited amount of land the district had to work with.

“The architects did a wonderful job designing this building,” he said. “The children will have a variety of means with which to receive instruction.”

Tara Randall, who has taught second grade in the district for five years, said she is excited about the opening of the new school.

“There’s much more room in here,” she said as she worked on setting up her new classroom this week. “And there’s color everywhere. I think it’s absolutely beautiful.”

Randall’s not the only one excited. She said students were eager to move in as early as last year.

“They were all, like, ‘Yea! A new building!’” she said.

Grygo said that excitement can be felt all over, and he thanked the community for their support of education through the passage of budgets and referendums that have helped make projects like the new primary school a reality.

He invited the public to attend the school’s ribbon-cutting ceremony at 2 p.m. Aug. 28.

“I really think we’re headed in the right direction, and I really appreciate the support of the community in making it happen,” Grygo said. “This is the kind of place that invites you to learn.”