By Beth Cassidy
Enterprise Record

Calling the high school issue a political grenade, Superintendent Dr. Darrin Hartness asked a standing room-only crowd last week to embrace a solution for the common good of the community, a new high school for all students of Davie County.
The price tag: $53.7 million.
That is the projected amount it will cost to build one new school of 328,800 square feet with a capacity of 1,800 to 2,000 at the Farmington Road site adjacent to North Davie Middle School.
At the school board’s called meeting/work session, moved from the boardroom to the senior center, the approximately 150 seats quickly filled up, with the overflow of the crowd standing around the room and into the hallway, waiting to see the plan for a new high school, the plan for repurposing the old one, and the costs of each.
Presented by Clark Pierce of Walter Robbs Callahan and Pierce architects, the schematic design for the new Davie High includes a three-story classroom tower with 69 classrooms, an auditorium, gym, auxiliary gym, wrestling space, multipurpose spaces, larger art areas with an outdoor patio, a media center almost double the size of the current one, a career and technical education space, cafeteria seating for 660, outdoor dining, and an abundance of natural light.
There is room for expansion.
Also on the campus will be a 4,500-seat stadium, additional tennis courts to be added to the courts already at North Davie, softball and baseball fields and practice fields.
Students would have at least three ways to get into the school during arrival times, but once school was in session, the only access to the interior of the school is through the administration area, which Pierce said would address security issues.
The plan is 116,800 square feet larger than the plan proposed three years ago. Pierce said that is because some of the programs, such as advanced placement classes, CTE and athletics were to remain at the old campus, but putting them all on one campus created the need for additional square footage.
Architect Wesley Curtis said the layout of the school is similar to the previous plan.
One of the features is “a Davie owned item,” an orange feature wall with the War Eagle logo, visible from the front of the building and from other areas on the site. Clint Junker remarked later he “got emotional” when he saw the wall on the slideshow …