Union Elementary School is the oldest Franklin school, and will expand to increase capacity in the coming years.
ANDY BELL-BALTACI | DAILY JOURNAL
Leaders at Franklin Community Schools will look to expand Union Elementary School in the coming years.
The Franklin school board approved Indianapolis-based architecture firm Schmidt Associates as the lead architect for future projects in June after the group presented renderings for a possible expansion of Union Elementary that preserves historical elements of the building and would increase capacity to about 600 students.
The exercise was a hypothetical one, but now Franklin schools will move ahead with planning for a renovation and expansion project, which Schmidt Associates will have first priority in designing, said David Clendening, superintendent.
Opened in 1928 with a capacity of about 200 students, the school is the smallest and oldest of the eight buildings in the school district.
The need for expansion comes as school leaders prepare for at least 1,750 single-family homes and more than 525 multi-family apartment units to be built within Franklin’s school district boundaries in the coming years. About 600 of those homes will be built in the vicinity of Union Elementary, with about 200 students projected to come out of those homes, Clendening said in June.
Union currently has an enrollment of 184 students, an increase of 36 students since the last school year. During the summer, district administrators altered school boundaries, moving hundreds of students to new Franklin schools to accommodate for future growth.
“The building, as we see it today, cannot accommodate a bunch of new students. That’s the target with Union,” Clendening said. “Probably our most significant step was engaging Schmidt Associates, which does historical restoration projects. It would not be in the near future we add on to or change the configuration of Union. We’re still in the early stages.”
Given the project is still in the preliminary phases, there is no budget for it yet, he said.
Schmidt Associates did not return a request for comment by deadline.
Development in Bargersville, just north of where the school is located, will add students to Union Elementary School in particular, as Bargersville’s Union Township residents attend the school, said Tina Gross, chief financial officer for Franklin schools.
“One of the challenges with the Bargersville growth is we’re pretty much at maximum capacity at Union. We’re going to have to figure out how to increase capacity there,” Gross said. “We’re working with financial advisors to speed up paying off the high school without raising the tax rate, because if we wait until 2027, it will be too late and those students will already be (transferring) somewhere else.”
School leaders hope design work will begin next year, which itself could take anywhere from six months to a year. With the expansion, the goal is to at least double capacity, she said.
