The Republic School District will celebrate the completion of its activities center this week with a ribbon cutting and tours. The new indoor facility at Republic High School is now being used by students.
Jason Perkins, Republic Schools’ assistant superintendent of operations, said the $26.5 million project has gone well overall, but there were a few challenges.
“We’ve had a few delays with the supply chain getting some of the materials we needed," he said. "We had some soil issues at the very first, just making sure that we got a good, strong foundation. Then, once we got rolling, the construction process has been really smooth.”
The Republic Activities Center is a multi-use, two-story building, and Perkins said it will be used by students and the community.
“It has a full 120-yard indoor turf field. And then there’s also on the bottom floor is a large community room. There is a cheer and dance room, there’s a new weight room, there’s a band wing that has three rehearsal spaces for our band program, and then we move upstairs there is a new wrestling room," he said. "There’s a new JROTC space, there is a choir space, there’s three classrooms upstairs, and there is a golf simulator room.”
Perkins said the community room that can be used by the public.
He said the new building will accommodate a growing wrestling program, and it will allow practice of all kinds to proceed uninterrupted despite the weather.
"There are times whenever we've had to maybe cancel a practice or we've had to move practice to late in the evening or early in the morning," said Perkins. "And so, by having this indoor facility, we're able to practice and keep our same practice schedule. Our turf area is large enough that we can have two to three different programs operating at the same time from the way that we've set it up."
Growth in the district prompted the construction of the new activities center. Perkins said in the last five years they’ve added 40 to 60 students per year, and many homes and apartments are being built or are planned in the area.
He said the practice fields in the indoor athletics facilities they toured were 50 to 60 yards. After talking with the band directors, he said, they learned that there was a need for an 80-yard field, "so we decided to go 80 yards and we're like, well, if we're going to go 80, we might as well go the full field."
Space has opened in the high school due to programs like band, JROTC and choir moving to the activities center. Perkins said they’re still determining the best uses for it.
The grand opening will start at 5 p.m. on Wednesday, September 30.
