A growing Higley High School broke ground on a new academic building Tuesday, Sept. 6, which will bring additional classroom space to campus. The school is up to 2,234 students enrolled this year.
The $8.57 million building is expected to be ready in 10 months, in time for the 2023-24 school year to start.
"It's an exciting day for our Higley Knights,” Principal Alan Fields said. “As growth and enrollment continues at our school, we've been working hard to bring this project to life. This vision has been years in the making, and today that vision is becoming a reality.”
Higley USD officials touted the community nature of the project with various stakeholders down to students involved in giving input on the design.
“This has fully been a community project at all phases of its inception,” Superintendent Dawn Foley said. “We cannot wait to see this come to fruition and to help provide our Higley Knights with limitless possibilities for their academic journey.”
Gilbert Mayor Brigette Peterson was on hand to congratulate the district on the milestone.
“No matter what happens in all the education choices that we have in this area, Higley still continues to grow and boom because parents know where their kids are going to get a top-notch education and have amazing extracurricular activities that they can be part of,” she said. “I'm so proud of you and the work that you do and the efforts to that it takes to get to this point.”
The high school, established in 2001, was built with the state’s School Facilities Board money and thus done to minimum specifications as the state requires. The project is to expand the school to accommodate growth and update facilities to modernize them.
The building was paid for from 2013 bond money.
DLR is the architectural firm and Chasse Building Team the construction contractor on the project.
Tom Blodgett Senior News Editor | Gilbert @sp_blodgett
Meet Tom Tom Blodgett joined Independent Newsmedia, Inc., USA, in 2022, when the company acquired Community Impact Newspaper's Phoenix-area properties. Raised in Arizona, he has spent more than 35 years in journalism in the state.
Community: He has served as an instructional professional in the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication since 2005, and is editorial adviser to The State Press, the university's independent student media outlet. He also is director of operations for an 18U girls fastpitch softball team from Gilbert.
Education: Arizona State University with a BS in Journalism.
Random Fact: He lived in Belgium during his freshman year of high school.
Hobbies: Tweeting enthusiastically about ASU softball (season-ticket holder) and grumpily about other local sports (pessimistic fan).
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