St. Paul Lutheran School celebrates growth with groundbreaking

“You will look back on this someday, and maybe bring your children and grandchildren here.”

-Principal Jim Wegner, to his students

By Brandi Makuski

St. Paul Lutheran School celebrated a groundbreaking for two new classrooms this week.

 

 

 

 

“Groundbreaking” is a figurative description for the occasion, school leaders say. Outside of securing foundation beams into the concrete on the north side of the school, no actual ground was broken on April 26.

But the school’s students and staff, along with representatives from Ellis Construction and Heartland Custom Homes gathered for a special ceremony marking the start of construction. The school’s pre-K students — who will be the first occupants of the new classrooms this fall — helped install bolts during the ceremony.

Principal Jim Wegner, who’s been running the school for eight years, said enrollment is up — so much so, that it’s time to test the waters of expansion.

“We’re running out of space,” Wegner said. “This will provide us space for the next three-to-five years, and we’ll see what the good Lord plans for us in the future. If enrollment continues to grow, as we hope and pray, then we’ll build something more permanent.”

According to Butch Weege, a longtime member of the church, St. Paul Lutheran added its school in 1957 with 16 students. Weege sent his three children to the school, and now has grandchildren among its nearly 200 students, ranging from pre-kindergarten to grade eight.

Weege was one of several congregants present for the informal ceremony. He also volunteered his time to help initiate the expansion, which measures 110′ by 24′.

“It’ll buy us some time to see if the population bubble at our school is real, so in three, four, five years, we’ll see if this will be removed permanently, or we begin a formal campaign for a permanent structure,” Wegee said. “We’re building our future.”

Ellis Construction Co., the Stevens Point-based company that also oversaw the original construction of the school, was hired as the design-build contractor. Heartland Custom Homes, Inc., based in Plover, will do the framing.

Wegner said he doesn’t believe there’s one driver to the school’s growth, crediting a number of factors like school choice, public school politics, a low teacher-to-student ratio, and possibly, a growing number of families returning to faith.

“Our congregation and school are growing at about the same rate, and we have tremendous support from our congregation,” he said, adding that for the first time, the school will have two classes for pre-K, kindergarten, and first-grade students.

Weege added the school was known for having an “unpinning of excellent teachers here…word of mouth travels fast.”

Steve Chizzo, director of architectural services for Ellis, said to accommodate the removable classroom addition, a firewall was installed on the exterior north wall of the main school building. The new classrooms will have everything any other classroom would have, except running water. To accommodate, crews created a doorway next to bathroom facilities.

Ratios in the younger classrooms have hit 21 students for every one teacher, Weege said, higher than what the school is designed for. Adding the new classrooms will keep it at about 15-1.

The $580,000 project comes from the church’s “Building for Christ Fund,” according to Weege, adding the school is in the process of hiring additional staff.

“Our parents are very happy to hear about this growth. And word of mouth is the best free marketing you can have,” he said. “With a little luck and God’s grace, maybe we’ll be looking at a capitol campaign here in the near future.”