Students and their parents got their first look at the new Oconto Falls Middle School on Aug. 4, eager to see how the new place could enhance their education much more than the former Washington Middle School.
Voters in November 2022 approved a $37.6 million referendum that enabled the new school along with security upgrades and roof replacements at Oconto Falls High School and Oconto Falls and Abrams elementary schools.
Savings from construction enabled the district to move forward with a new cafeteria and commons area at the Abrams school. The work was considered necessary but was removed after a $49.9 million referendum question was defeated in April 2022.
Stuart Russ, the new superintendent for the Oconto Falls School District, told a crowd of more than 200 people that the new middle school was completed ahead of time and under budget, welcome word to a community eager to have its middle school education and infrastructure come into the 21st century.
“This couldn’t be done without your support,” Russ said to the crowd.
Although Russ inherited the new middle school, a lot of the legwork came from the leadership of Dean Hess, the previous superintendent, who retired earlier this year. Hess noted the planning for this new middle school goes all the way back to 2015.
“This is not something that happened in a short duration,” Hess said. “Back in 2015, when I came in for an interview process, the board actually let me know that this was something that they expected us to accomplish.”
The first step was determining what the district’s finances were to see if a new middle school was possible, according to Hess. After that, the Gauthier family sold their homestead across the street from Oconto Falls High School to the district and work began in earnest to make the new middle school a reality.
“Our first attempt to pass the capital referendum didn’t work out the way we were hoping for,” Hess said. “However, we talk about grit and the importance of responding. We reached out, we got this information, and you supported the opportunity to get this accomplished. This doesn’t happen without you.”
Hess noted that he’d never been through a school design process before, but Somerville Architects in Green Bay and Nexus Solutions in Madison made it easy. He noted that staff and community members took part in the design and planning.
Hess praised the fact that the middle school would now be adjacent to both OFHS and Oconto Falls Elementary School.
“We’re excited to have our students step forward and be the benefactors of and reap the benefits of this new learning environment,” he said.
Oconto Falls School Board President Clint Gardebrecht said the new middle school will be more than the textbook definition of a school in Webster’s dictionary, which is an institution for educating children. He believes the school will benefit more than the students planning to start sixth, seventh or eighth grade in less than a month.
“A school is so much more than simply a building to teach our youth,” Gardebrecht said. “Schools have increasingly become the social hubs of communities, and this community has truly come together. Children, teachers, support staff, parents, grandparents and the community-at-large visit our schools throughout the year to participate in or attend amazing events like sports, theater, dance, Grandparents Day, homecoming — the list goes on and on.”
Gardebrecht also paid tribute to the old middle school, imagining that there must have been tremendous pride when that school opened in the 1950s.
“It is undeniable that Washington Middle School served our students well for a great many decades,” Gardebrecht said. “Here we stand in the present day … with that same sense of pride as we christen the new Oconto Falls Middle School at 330 County Road I.”
The ribbon cutting and open house also featured the debut of the Oconto Falls Middle School band, although some were band members with the former Washington Middle School.
Russ commented that the new middle school matches the work that the school’s staff has been doing, but allows it to do so with access to more and better technology.
“The art room is much larger than we’ve had before,” Russ said. “We’ve got some flexible space over in the kitchen area.”
lpulaski@newmedia-wi.com
