New Crestline Elementary facility has 718 students and room to grow

Principal Karissa Lang said the school’s enrollment has been steadily rising over the years, with 718 students there this year, and the 105,000-square-foot school has room for up to 1,000 students. Students were able to move into the new school in May, shortly before the end of last school year.

Big windows provide plenty of natural light to the library at the new Crestline Elementary School. Photo by Jeronimo Nisa.

Parents and families have car lines in the front and back of the school to drop their children off, so despite the many students Thursday, traffic ran smoothly.

“Having that drop-off lane in the back for kindergarten through fourth grade is going to allow all that traffic to stay off Crestline Drive,” Lang said. “Now we have the new pre-K and (special needs) drop off, so that’s roughly 200 kids that will be dropped off in the front area. The way the long driveway runs allows traffic in that car line to stay off Crestline Drive as well.”

The total enrollment for pre-K students this year is 179, with the pre-K programs that previously were in three elementary schools now centralized at Crestline.

Lang said for the next few weeks, workers will continue to clear rubble from the old school that was demolished in June, but the school’s old gymnasium will be used for the pre-K program.

Pre-K teacher Lauren Brock comes to the new facility from F.E. Burleson after teaching kindergarten and pre-K there for 10 years.

“Our main goal is to make sure that they are school ready,” Brock said. “With us, we want them to learn how to go to school, how to treat others, how to share; that way when they move into kindergarten next year, they’ll be ready. Kindergarten is a lot more advanced now than it used to be.”

Out back, workers were busy spreading mulch on the school’s three new playgrounds: one for the pre-K program, one designed for children with special needs, and one for the general student population. The special needs and general student population playgrounds are located right beside each other.

Students walk to their classroom at the new Crestline Elementary School in Hartselle on Thursday. Photo by Jeronimo Nisa.

“That way, they can go and play with each other if they want to and they are not alienated from each other,” Lang said.

Lang said Crestline students haven’t had access to a playground for the past two school years because of the equipment being stored during the construction of the new school. She said students should be able to use the playgrounds on Monday, which can’t come soon enough for some of the school’s students.

“I feel like there’s going to be a lot more things that you can play on and we’ll be able to enjoy ourselves outside a lot more,” said fourth grader Hannah Smallwood.

“A lot of people have been at the old school for a long time, and with this building, it’s something new,” fourth grader Lucy Hulgan said.

Hulgan and Smallwood, along with their classmate Eliza Jane Green, intend on applying to be the first school ambassadors at the new school this year. Lang said they will select ambassadors next month.

Down the hall, a music room filled with bongo drums with uniquely painted shells and other instruments awaits students this week, an improvement from the detached building outside of the old school. Music teacher Liz Bass said having a classroom within the facility makes her feel more connected to her fellow teachers.

“I love it. I love seeing the kids walk by and it’s just so nice being around the corner and being able to get to everyone real quickly and easily,” Bass said.

Bass teaches music lessons to each grade once a week and coordinates the grade-level music performances that take place throughout the year and an “arts day” is being considered for this school year.

“During Christmas, we’ll do a different program for each grade level and I’ll do a patriotic program for third and fourth graders because I think it’s really important we teach them about patriotism,” Bass said.

Lang said a bigger STEM lab will allow teachers to expand instruction and introduce new projects to the students, and teachers using the school’s new outdoor classroom will be able to teach students more about local plants and wildlife. The outdoor classroom includes a turtle habitat, a water catchment system, a pond, raised flower beds and a dry creek bed area.

“It’s bigger, which is what we needed, and we can put more learning stations in,” Lang said. “That outdoor classroom is supposed to be a learning area and we never had a space before where we could take a class out and they could be in a shaded area where teachers can teach and do more hands-on items, but now we can.”