More than 10 years in the making, Waverly Elementary/Middle School finally opened with a ribbon cutting Thursday morning. The nearly $27 million school is the first totally new school built in Baltimore City since 1998.
The event resembled a pep rally, complete with cheerleaders and other entertainment.
Waverly’s principal Amanda Price excitedly welcomed visitors—including Governor Martin O’Malley and Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings Blake--to the ceremony. She told the crowd that she has big plans for her students in their new building. “I intend to taking us to greatness, I intend on making this an advanced academic school, I intend on making us an ivy school and we will do it because I believe in each and every one of you boys and girls,” Price said.
O’Malley praised Waverly’s students for being one of the state’s few schools that saw standardized test scores rise last year under the new Common Core standards. He described the ribbon cutting for the new school a major accomplishment, especially considering the cutbacks education programs have experienced during the recent tough economic years. “One thing some states stopped doing was investing in education, school construction and reconstruction, but not our state. We decided to do more rather than less,” O’Malley said. “It’s really an important investment not only for the achievement of our children but the future of all of these neighborhoods that look to this school as a bit of an anchor.”
Mayor Rawlings-Blake said state-of-the-art schools like Waverly, that are equipped with lots of spaces and materials to prepare students for the 21st century, will make residents want to stay in Baltimore. She says it lets them know that the city can provide schools that reflect the aspirations they have for their children. “I don’t know of one thing that will have as long lasting an impact, not just on this community but communities throughout the city,” Rawlings-Blake said.
Some construction is still underway at Waverly. The 133,000 sq. ft. school is being built in two phases. The completion of phase one includes environmentally-friendly classrooms and other spaces with lots of natural lighting. When phase two is completed in December, it will house 900 students in grades pre-K through eight. The elementary and middle school students were in two separate buildings. With the new building, they will all be under one roof, an environmentally-friendly green roof at that.