11-03-2024 3:50am

County finally makes good on plan to build long awaited Fairwood school

A sprawling patch of open space will be home to a new school in Fairwood, pictured Nov. 1, 2024. Catherine Hollingsworth/The Bowie Sun

Ringed by footpaths and the gold and crimson trees of autumn, the long awaited Fairwood Elementary School is coming into focus after a recent groundbreaking program showcased plans for playgrounds, athletic fields, a rain garden and a modern space for learning.

The school had stalled for so long that it seemed hard for some residents to believe.

“Is this really going to happen?” That’s the question that Prince George’s County Schools superintendent Millard House would often get from his neighbors, he said during the groundbreaking ceremony Oct. 4, according to a transcript. House is also a Fairwood resident.

The land for the school site was part of the developer’s plan to build “more than 1,000 acres” of new homes on the old Fairwood Turf Farm. The homes went up about 20 years ago but the school was never built, leaving the massive Fairwood subdivision without a neighborhood school.

An idyllic open field designated for the Fairwood school remained untouched for decades, a constant reminder of the unkept promise to the community.

A group of parents held on to that promise.

“We’re standing on 20 years of advocacy.” - Prince George's County Councilmember Wala Blegay

Those parents have been pushing for the school to be built for 18 years, District 6 County Councilmember Wala Blegay said at the groundbreaking, the transcript said. “We’re standing on 20 years of advocacy,” she said to an audience that included parents whose kids are now too old to attend the school.

Fairwood Elementary is scheduled to be completed in 2027 and serve 650 students in pre-kindergarten to fifth grade. In addition to modern classrooms, the school will feature a gym, art and music studios and a garden, based on the design finalized this year.

It will be located off Fairwood Parkway, just outside the Bowie city limits.

WELCOME, WOODMORE WILDCATS

The school will accommodate students who were zoned to Woodmore Elementary School, officials said.

“We have students that are in a swing space who go to Woodmore … however, we ensured that the building was going to be built big enough so that it can accommodate residents of Fairwood,” school board member Zipporah Miller told The Bowie Sun.

Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks lauded the building’s construction, saying in a press release that it finally delivers on a pledge to the Fairwood Community.

“A pledge to build a school was made (to them) years ago, and was a key part of what attracted many families to this community,” said Alsobrooks, who is also the Democratic candidate for U.S. senator from Maryland this year. “Unfortunately, that promise went unfulfilled for a long time and for years, these residents advocated tirelessly to get the school their community needed.”

Woodmore Elementary School, one of the higher performing schools in the area, was in urgent need of repair. “It was actually, at one point slated to be closed because of the lower enrollment,” said Blegay, who represents Fairwood.

Rather than close, Woodmore Elementary was moved from its location in Mitchellville to temporary space at Meadowbrook Elementary on Moylan Drive in Bowie.

County officials hope that the new school will bring those students back to the Fairwood community. “We do believe that many people would be more interested in bringing their kids back to school once they know that a new school is coming,” Blegay said in an interview.

A BLUEPRINT SCHOOL

The Fairwood school has a budget of $70 million and is scheduled to be begin construction next year, according to the school system. It is one of eight schools set to be built or replaced in phase two of the Blueprint Schools project. Previously, six schools were built or replaced in phase one.

The schools are “rapidly aging, which brought us to a need of over $8.5 billion to repair, modernize, or replace those structures over 20 years,” said Miller, who represents Bowie and Upper Marlboro on the school board.

Prince George’s County has the second largest school district in Maryland, with over 200 schools, many of them in need of repair or upgrades.

County officials say they have worked hard to secure construction of the Fairwood school. “For them to actually get it to this stage was really monumental, and we’re grateful for the efforts and the hard work to ensure that this came to pass for the Fairwood community,” Miller said.

Around the time that the Fairwood subdivision opened in the early 2000s, the county created a funding source for school construction. A 2003 county bill established a developer surcharge on building permits to help pay for new schools. But that surcharge does not cover the county’s entire debt for school projects; general funds are also needed to cover school construction bonds, a 2022 county analysis found.

Last year, Fairwood Elementary School was included in the Alternative Construction Finance program, a public-private program that aims to build new schools faster and in a cost-effective manner.

Read the Fairwood school chronology for some local history.

Caitlyn Blake covers Bowie as part of the University of Maryland Local News Network. Catherine Hollingsworth contributed to this report.

This article was updated Nov. 17 to indicate that the groundbreaking remarks were not reported in person but were from a video transcript.