The School Board in Rutherford County has voted "yes" to moving forward with the adjusted plan of bumping up building and renovation.
They have needed more classroom space as the growth in Murfreesboro has been tremendous.
With more and more families moving there and building homes, there has been a need for new schools and bigger classrooms earlier than 2018.
“Our projections are showing we're going to run out of high school seats before that date so we need to move that up,” said James Evans, Rutherford County Schools Spokesman.
Thursday night, the school board voted on some changes to its five-year building projections.
“We're talking about a new middle school, elementary school in Smyrna area, and a new high school in Rockvale,” Evans said.
Under the board’s adjusted plan, a new high school could open in 2019 instead of 2020.
Land in Smyrna has been cleared for a new elementary and middle school. They would both go up a year early beginning in 2017.
Also, the renovations to Smyrna Middle and David Youree Elementary schools would also be in 2017.
“It’s more than 200 million over the next five years in order to accomplish these projects,” Evans said.
School officials said they’ve known something had to be done. Rutherford County Schools have already been relying on 144 trailers for all three levels, and growth trends have continued to skyrocket.
“Years ago we have grown by about 10,000 students during that time, and over the next 10 years we are looking to grow by 12 and 14,000,” Evans said.
The next step planned for the board is to submit the plan to the County Commission for funding.
