DeKalb District 428 breaks ground on new Dr. Leroy A. Mitchell Elementary School

DeKALB – DeKalb School District 428 is doing its part to ensure that students have access to a 21st Century School in their neighborhood to call home.

A groundbreaking ceremony and name unveiling was held Thursday morning for the new Dr. Leroy A. Mitchell Elementary School.

During the event, renderings were posted in the tent for visitors to get a glimpse of what the building, 1240 Normal Road, will look like once complete. The new elementary school, which is expected to cost about $33 million, has an opening date tentatively scheduled for 2025, officials said.

Superintendent Minerva Garcia-Sanchez touted the lengths the district has come with this project. The DeKalb school board decided in 2022 to make a new school a priority of the district to reduce classroom sizes, officials said.

“It will represent a place of progress, pride and ownership,” Garcia-Sanchez said. “We look forward to reducing space constrains at all of our schools. Being able to more effectively allocate resources district-wide and having more flexibility to accommodate continued growth in specialized programs. How we must educate looks very different than it did five or 10 years ago. Since the [COVID-19] pandemic, we have changed how we think and how we prepare to support our students. The way that we delivered instruction before is no longer the way that we can deliver it now. We have to think forward.”

“I’m hoping some child will know that because there was an adopted kid, a foster kid who made it, that school is named after, that they could make it, too.”

—  Leroy A. Mitchell, of DeKalb, on the Dr. Leroy A. Mitchell Elementary School name

School board president Deyci Ramirez said she couldn’t be more excited to celebrate this milestone.

“As we look ahead to the future of this school, I am filled with optimism and confidence,” Ramirez said. “I have no doubt that this new elementary school will become a beacon of excellence, a hub of learning and discovery and a source of pride for our community.”

The 70,000-square-foot school will serve 450 to 500 kindergarten through fifth grade students. The school will feature music and art classrooms, a STEAM classroom for science, technology, engineering and art education, spaces designed to accommodate services for special needs students, outdoor learning and innovation pods and staff spaces to hold restorative conversations for student discipline.

Amonaquenette Parker, the district’s director of diversity and inclusion, said it’s clear that a new elementary school is necessary in the north corridor, and the district stands ready to meet the need, despite any questions the district may receive.

“It’s because it’s where our children are,” Parker said.

A lifelong learner and pastor emeritus at New Hope Missionary Baptist Church, Leroy Mitchell said he’s grateful for the recognition that the district bestowed on him by naming the building after him.

Mitchell has strong ties to the DeKalb community. He was a foster parent to more than 50 children after growing up in the foster care system himself. Mitchell has four kids of his own.

“I’m hoping some child will know that because there was an adopted kid, a foster kid who made it, that school is named after, that they could make it, too,” Mitchell said.

The district incorporated extensive public feedback from community conversations into the naming selection process, officials said.

Garcia-Sanchez said she believes the district made the right choice naming the building after Mitchell.

“I challenge every child and every adult that enters this building to live up to the name of the namesake of this building,” she said.