Young Ideas, Backed by Experience
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For the first time in a century, Gardner constructed a new elementary school that was built for the purpose of housing elementary school students. The last time the City constructed an elementary school was in 1923 when Prospect Street School was opened.
This $90 million project, funded in partnership with the Massachusetts School Building Authority, now houses Gardner’s students in Pre School through 4th Grade, creating a state of the art, 21st Century learning environment for our students as they begin their studies in Gardner.
In the FY2022 budget, Mayor Nicholson re-instated the elementary school band program at Gardner Elementary School. In its second year of existence, the program already had over 200 students enrolled in the band!
As a way to help maintain that momentum and grow our music education programs across the Gardner Public School District, Mayor Nicholson put forward a proposal that was approved by the City Council to allocate $100,000 from the City’s Free Cash/Surplus to go toward purchasing new equipment, technology, instruments, supplies, and items to enrich all band, choral, and drama programs across the district.
This is the largest one-time investment in Music Education in Gardner Public Schools history.
In 2017, the City began the process of constructing a complete renovation of the Watkins Field facility at the Gardner Public Schools campus.
This work was completed in June of 2023 when the outdoor bathroom and snack shack facility was completed.
Prior to this building being constructed, spectators at all events at the facility needed to leave the gates and go into the high school building to use the restroom and the food serving area was rather small for the size events taking place.
This facility now alleviates the concern of having unknown people within the school building and makes things easier for those vending food items during events.
Aside from the Watkins Field Complex, the City performed multiple repairs on the remaining fields located at the Gardner Public Schools Campus.
This work includes