GREENSBORO — At a price of about $2.5 million, the Guilford County Board of Education has approved the purchase of land to build a new K-8 school in the Colfax community.
The new school — to be named for famed NASA mathematician Katherine Johnson — is expected to have a Science, Technology, Engineering and Math theme, and include STEM laboratories for use by the students there. It will serve kindergarten through eighth grade, a configuration that’s more common in other states and among charter schools and private schools.
Money to purchase the land and to build the school is expected to come from the proceeds from school construction bonds previously approved by Guilford County voters.
Guilford County commissioners will also have to approve the price for the sale.
The nearly 28 acres on South Bunker Hill and Boylston roads were recently annexed and rezoned by the City of High Point to pave the way for the land deal for the school.
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Colfax neighbors fought to keep the school annexation and rezoning from happening, bringing forward a wide variety of concerns including traffic and quality-of-life issues, but failed to convince High Point City Council not to go ahead with the moves.
School district leaders have said the new school is planned in response to growth in west and southwest Guilford County and to reduce overcrowding of nearby elementary schools. It’s planned as a neighborhood school, meaning students who attend would come from surrounding areas.
Six school board members voted in favor of the purchase, with board members Crissy Pratt and Linda Welborn voting against it and Vice Chairwoman Bettye Jenkins absent.
Speaking briefly following Tuesday night’s school board meeting, Pratt and Welborn said they voted against the purchase in solidarity with the Colfax community members who had organized against the annexation, rezoning and purchase. Neither shared an alternate proposal for the location of the school.
Pratt said she knows there are a lot of people there who are upset about the sale, and she said she found their concerns about traffic, “really valid.”
“They did do an awesome job of trying to represent their concerns,” Welborn said. “Hopefully we at least listened, and make sure that we avoid, or minimize, or fix their concerns as best as possible.”