Deep in the northwest corner of Limestone County sits the town of Lester and the newest addition to the Limestone County School District, Sugar Creek Elementary School.

The school combines Owens and West Limestone elementary schools into one. Principal Cleo Miller, former principal of Owens, said the decision was a needed one.

“West Limestone needed an elementary school, and Owens needed an elementary school because the school was 70 years old,” Miller said. “Instead of building two elementary schools, they decided to merge the two into one.”

Owens shut its doors for good over the summer, while West devoted the entire campus to its remaining 6-12 students. Sugar Creek opened its doors to students for this first time earlier this month, welcoming grades K-5 to a state-of-the-art experience.

A new beginning

One of the biggest differences between Sugar Creek’s campus and its predecessors is the level of security. Visitors to Sugar Creek must be buzzed in by someone in the office before entering an air lock lobby equipped with bulletproof glass.

Once they are signed in, they can continue to a rotunda with the school’s mascot on the floor. From here, one can see straight down any hall. Meanwhile, Miller’s office has a perfect view of the area, which is currently doubling as a makeshift P.E. area but will soon be a common area for students.

Another difference is the gymnasium. The school is waiting for bleachers to be installed before it allows children to have class or assemblies inside. Once complete, it will not only be used for booster clubs, P.E. class and meetings, but also as a community tornado shelter capable of accommodating 1,100 people.

Collaborative spaces bring Sugar Creek even further into the future. Miller said each grade will get its own collaborative space, including kindergarten.

“These will be areas where (students) can come out and work on projects together,” Miller said. “They will have some time built in when they can come out and work on different activities, different assignments.”

Outside, the new campus includes two playgrounds and a large parking lot for dropping off and picking up students. Miller said that they are able to unload 17 cars at one time, with that number doubling after buses leave.

Room to grow

While some wings have a use for every classroom, others have empty classrooms for future use. In the kindergarten wing, there are currently six classes but room for eight. Head Start has room for four with space to add four more later, though only two are slated for use this year.

Miller said there were more than 600 students registered for Sugar Creek this year. With its current classroom goal of only 18 to 20 students per class, there can be around 750 in the school.

“We try to keep it at 18 to 20, but if we did 25 or more, we could probably get 800 or more,” Miller said.

Those students will also get the chance to do some growing of their own throughout the school year. Miller said there are plans to start a garden at the school this year and maybe even a chicken coop.

“We talked about having some chickens and getting a chicken coop so they can use that for a learning experience,” Miller said. “We have some real neat things planned for after school.”

Some of the same

While much of the school is new, there are still a few things being kept from Owens and West. Miller said the only new faculty member is the art teacher, who worked in Birmingham last year.

Everyone else is from Owens or West. This includes their media specialist, Erin Elkins, who worked in the Owens library last year.

This year, Elkins will be in charge of the Sugar Creek Media Center, though she admits it’s tough to get used to the name.

“I’ve got a Facebook page and I call it the ‘Sugar Creek Elementary Library Media Center’ because I’m still partial to the library part, but then the library’s changing,” Elkins said. “It’s not just about the books anymore. There’s so much more.”

This is true. In addition to the 18,000 physical copies of books and hundreds of additional ebooks, Elkins said the media center will have areas for students to work together on projects.

There will even be a place for students to create news segments and learn about journalism.

Of course, not everything has changed. Elkins said fifth graders will still get the chance to work as “library leaders” and that classic programs like Accelerated Reading are still going strong.

And when students are done with the school day, Owen’s 21st Century program also transferred to Sugar Creek. Through a three-year renewable grant from the state, students get the chance to explore STEM projects and other activities they might not otherwise experience.

“You get a chance to do extraordinary things after school that you don’t get to do during the school day,” Miller said. “… Because we have the 21st Century grant, the students can have a lot more enrichment after school and for four weeks in the summer. They get to do a lot of neat things like bowling, swimming, going to the zoo and kayaking.”

Miller said that while the program — which lasts about three hours and includes a snack and transportation when needed — is completely different from the average day at school, it is still learning.

Some days might include field trips to farms or gardens.

“Kids actually plant the vegetables and they make salsa out of their vegetables,” Miller said. “They get to visit farms and see baby chickens and pigs. One of our faculty members has an organic garden, and they get a chance to visit that every spring and see what’s in her garden.”

Community effort

Several parts of the Limestone County have helped make Sugar Creek a reality. The name was one of many suggested by parents and students for the community to vote on. When it came to school colors, they voted for three instead of the usual two.

“West Limestone was blue and white, and Owens was red and white,” Miller said. “They didn’t want to part with either one, so we have red, white and blue.”

The use of bobcats as a mascot is a nod to the West Limestone Wildcats. Most Sugar Creek students will attend West Limestone High School after they complete fifth grade.

Now the school is mostly built. Construction workers are still around, but Miller said the work should be completely done by the end of this school year.

Meanwhile, teachers, volunteers and even Limestone County School District Superintendent Dr. Tom Sisk have worked to unload furniture, unpack boxes, arrange rooms and ready the school for students.

“Once everything is completed, we’ll have an open house for the community and parents to come in,” Miller said.

That could be any week now, but Miller was careful not to set a specific deadline.

“We still have a lot to do before we get all settled in,” she said.