At the beginning of March, spirits were high at the Knoxville Community School District following the residents of Knoxville’s approval for the issuance of just over $26 million in bonds to fund the construction of a new middle school and smaller projects associated with Northstar Elementary regarding HVAC. Since then, the district has been dealing with the fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic to include closure of the district for the remainder of the school year.

Despite the unprecedented times, the district continues to push ahead with the new middle school project, according to Knoxville School’s Superintendent Cassi Pearson, who tells KNIA/KRLS News the district is currently in the design phase with the project and will be looking at designs and construction documents throughout the summer and into the fall. She says the district will look to bid the project in mid to late fall with the best case scenario of accepting a bid in November or December. Pearson says as of now residents will begin seeing construction on the project in the spring of 20201.

According to Pearson the project is still on time despite COVID-19. She says the only real change was finding new ways to meet or hold discussions with the different entities involved in the project.