Grayson Carter & Son Contracting recently completed the ground work for the new Athens Bible School at 610 U.S. 31 North. The $12-million facility should be completed by January 2019.

It is an exciting year for Athens Bible School. Their new school building is progressing right on schedule and they just celebrated their 75th anniversary.

Although leaders at ABS are excited about their future, they have not forgotten their past and the many people who have molded the school into what it is today.

Dorene Chandler Dunnivant is one of these influencers. The last living graduate from the school’s first graduating class of 1944, Dunnivant will share some of her memories with ABS students March 2.

“We thought it would be fun for the kids,” Hagewood said. “She will give them a historical perspective of the school.”

Dunnivant has quite a story to tell. After graduating from ABS, she moved to Nashville, Tennessee, to study at David Lipscomb University. She ended up dropping out of Christian university to take a job teaching in the Limestone County public school system.

World War II had caused a teacher shortage in the area, so she signed on to teach at Thach School. The school was once located in the Elkmont community. As the war came to a close, the teacher shortage grew worse, leaving Dunnivant to teach the entire school of kindergartners through fifth-graders on her own.

“That was rough,” she said. “I would set up lessons for one grade and then move on to the next grade until I was through with them all. I had to rely on the older students to help me.”

She eventually left the public school system, returning to her alma mater to teach fifth grade. From 1960–1966, Dunnivant shared her love with the students at ABS. She remembers she had some “very smart students” during those years who “challenged her to keep up.”

She also had a reputation for being strict but fair.

Eventually, she moved to Decatur with her husband and three children. Soon after settling into their new home, she began substituting in the Morgan County school system, where she found herself in the middle of desegregation.

“Discipline became very difficult,” she said. “But I made sure I didn’t treat the children any different.”

“It was a scary time for all children, and I tried to make the process of desegregation as easy as possible for them,” she added. “The black children really loving me, and I loved them.”

She taught in Decatur for 13 years before deciding to retire so she could spend more time traveling with her husband. The couple, who were married 69 years before he passed away in 2015, visited all but eight states in the Union. Her favorite was Tennessee, a state she called home while attending university as a young woman.

Looking back over her 93 years, Dunnivant said somedays, she still misses teaching.

“I love children, and I worry about the way they are being educated with all this technology,” she said. “I am afraid that some schools are doing away with a lot of things people are going to need one day.”

She hopes Athens Bible will keep to the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic.

Dunnivant attended ABS’s 75th anniversary celebration last month. She looked forward to having her picture made with the class of 2018 when she visits the school in March.

Building the future

Gayle Hagewood, assistant director of development at the school, said they are still on track to be finished by January 2019. The groundwork is almost finished at the site on U.S. 31 North, and First Team Construction Co. has begun laying down footers.

Donations to the building fund continue to flow in as well. They have surpassed the halfway point, raising over $6 million so far.

Since construction of the new school began, Hagewood said they’ve seen a surge in registration, noting they enrolled several new students for the 2018-2019 school year just this week. With nearly 40 percent more space than the original building, the new school will be able to easily accommodate an influx of new students.