‘We’re ready to get started’
Rome City Schools hosts a groundbreaking ceremony for the new Main Elementary School.
With a flattened dirt plot behind him, where the new Main Elementary School will be erected, Rome City Schools Superintendent Lou Byars told the attendees of a groundbreaking ceremony Friday afternoon, “We’re ready to get started.”
Byars told school system and city officials, along with board members and Main alumni, that the contractor for the project, J&R Construction, has done a good job in keeping to schedule through the demolition of the main buildings of the old school.
“It’s exciting to begin this project,” Byars said.
The system is aiming to have the new school built and ready to open by the start of the 2019-20 school year. The project is estimated to cost approximately $10 million to $11 million and will be primarily funded by the 1-cent education local option sales tax, which voters approved an extension of this fall.
Board Chairwoman Faith Collins reiterated that safety concerns over the separation of buildings in the old school’s layout will be resolved with the new school.
It was three years in the making, Byars said, but when it is finished, the school will be “a shining light” for the system and the city.
Collins said it was fitting to hold the groundbreaking during Black History Month, considering the legacy of Main in educating black students during the period of segregation.
The Rev. Carey Ingram, the pastor of Lovejoy Baptist Church and a former Main student, said “this is the genesis of my start in school.”
He recalled what the Rev. Curtis Moreland, who was a principal at the elementary school, had written in his souvenir book.
While other kids had typical messages written in their books, Moreland wrote to Ingram: “Talk, talk, talk; cheat, cheat, cheat; do, do, do; and you will.”
In finishing his remarks, Ingram spoke to the importance of a good start in education.
“Simple words can mean so much,” he said. “Your beginning formulates what you’ll be in the end.”
Rome Mayor Jamie Doss echoed the historical significance of Main, while touching on how the new school can add to the quality of education for the city’s youth.
“A quality of education is key to quality of life,” he said. “A key to a strong finish is to have a strong start.”
Students who had gone to Main Elementary are currently going to school at North Heights Elementary. Once the new school is built, the students and staff at the consolidated North Heights will move over to Main. North Heights will then be refurbished as a sixthgrade academy — this is also an ELOST project.