Flint broke ground Wednesday on the city’s first new public high school in a half century.
“It’s been a long time coming,” said Kevelin Jones, superintendent of Flint Community Schools.
Despite a persistent light rain, Jones smiled broadly as he kicked off the ground breaking at the old Flint Central High School.
The old, crumbling school building has become emblematic of the city’s struggling public school district. In recent years, fewer and fewer students walked the halls of other aging Flint schools.
Jones said he believes the $135 million school will rejuvenate the Flint school district. The building will have innovative learning spaces, a state of the art performing theater and new athletic facilities, he said.
“Our scholars deserve to be taught in a building that’s state of the art. They deserve that,” said Jones, “Not only the scholars that we currently have enrolled, but the scholars that want to come back home.”
Jones said the school district currently has a little more than 600 high school students. He said the new high school will have room for a thousand students when it opens in 2028.
The Flint-based Mott Foundation is contributing $100 million to the project. The rest of the funding is coming from the state.
The Mott Foundation is one of Michigan Public's donors.
