The Chickasaw school system is preparing to bring a long-vacant elementary school building back into use, with the district’s board set to vote on a plan to reopen Hamilton Elementary School on Grant Street for the coming school year.
The building has sat empty since last May, after Mobile County’s magnet school program that had been housed there relocated to Eichold-Mertz Elementary in Mobile at the start of the 2014-15 school year. Under the proposal going before the Chickasaw school board Thursday, Hamilton would reopen in August serving grades K-5. Currently, every grade level in the Chickasaw district attends classes in the same building, a former high school on Chieftain Way.
Superintendent Kyle Kallhoff said the district is now in a strong enough financial position to reopen a second campus, pointing to progress announced in November by Chief Financial Officer Chris Arras, who reported the district had moved into the black by the end of the 2014 fiscal year. Kallhoff said the timing also lines up with practical needs. “Our student population continues to grow, and we’re running out of room on Chieftain Way,” he said.
Chickasaw inherited the Hamilton Elementary building as part of the 2012 separation agreement that created the city’s independent school system, splitting off from Mobile County schools. Under that agreement, Mobile County officials agreed to vacate the building within three years, ultimately handing over the keys in June 2014.
If the board approves the plan, Kallhoff said the district would likely add at least three new staff positions — a clerk, a cafeteria worker and a registered nurse — to support the reopened campus. The school is expected to be renamed Chickasaw Elementary, and officials anticipate enrollment of roughly 480 to 500 students based on current district numbers.
District leaders are also exploring options to expand preschool offerings using the additional space, including a possible Office of School Readiness grant. “We’ll have more room at Hamilton, so we want to serve that preschool population,” Kallhoff said. The Chickasaw school board’s meeting is open to the public and begins at 6 p.m. Thursday at the district’s central office on North Craft Highway.