WS Chronicle

Construction is officially underway on the new Brunson Elementary School. On Monday, Feb. 17, representatives from the district, county and the city came together for a groundbreaking ceremony at the proposed site of the new school, near the corner of Ivy Ave. and Northwest Blvd.  

During the groundbreaking, Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools (WS/FCS) Superintendent Tricia McManus said this is the beginning of a new chapter for Brunson. She said it will be exciting to see the vacant land be transformed into a space for learning.  

“Brunson has long been a place of high academic standards and learning for students and it has a strong focus on STEM education, one that the staff will carry with them to this new location,” McManus said. “Over the next year it will be exciting to see the investment we’ve made turn this underutilized property into a great space of learning and discovery.”  

Anissia Scales, the principal at Brunson, said students, parents, faculty and staff are overjoyed about the possibilities of the future.  

“While this is only my third year as the lead learner at Brunson Elementary, I can tell you that there is pure joy and excitement around our new school. We are simply overjoyed and excited,” Scales said.  

As a STEM magnet school, students at Brunson learn the basic curriculum, but with an emphasis on science, technology, engineering, and math. STEM magnet schools also use a hands-on approach to learning and offer specialized teaching techniques and personalized learning. The new state-of-the-art facility will allow students to explore even more possibilities in STEM. Several students were also on hand during the groundbreaking to talk about their plans for the new school.  

The current home of Brunson Elementary School, 155 N. Hawthorne Road, was constructed more than 60 years ago and is built on a floodplain. Talks about replacing it have been ongoing for nearly a decade and voters approved construction in the 2016 education bond.  

To help reach a decision about the future of Brunson, in 2020 the district issued a survey to nearly 600 parents, teachers, students, and others in the community. Those surveyed had the opportunity to decide whether they would like to see Brunson rebuilt at the current location, combining with Cook Literacy Model School, relocating to the Ivy Avenue location, or relocating to the Crossnore School and Children’s Home on Reynolda Road.  

Despite concerns from district leaders about the Ivy Avenue site being listed on the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality’s (NCDEQ) list of brownfield sites, 67% of those surveyed wanted to relocate to Ivy Avenue. About 25% said they wanted Brunson to be rebuilt at its current site and only about 8% thought the two schools should merge.  

A brownfield site is an abandoned, idled or underused property where the threat of environmental contamination has hindered its redevelopment. The N.C. Brownfields Program, which is administered by the Division of Waste Management, is the state’s effort to break this barrier to the redevelopment of these sites. The Brownfields Property Reuse Act of 1997 sets forth funding and other assistance to help prospective developers to put the sites back to use.  

Construction for the new Brunson Elementary is estimated to cost about $35 million and it is expected to take about two years to complete.