Thank you for being here today and celebrating this memorable occasion.
Lyndon Johnson said “We must open the doors of opportunity. But we must also equip our people to walk through those doors.”
With the opening of this facility, from planning and design to construction and implementation we now have the ability to “equip” our students to walk through those doors of opportunity – no matter where they are.
With an eye toward responsibility – but with a plan toward life long learning – we have put in place a sustainable building; a building that will enhance our student’s ability and desire to learn. Embracing Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design – through day lit classrooms, geothermal wells, water conserving cisterns, the selection and installation of low emission carpets, paint, furniture, and fabrics will provide the positive climate that our educational accomplishments need and have been missing.
Allowing these green mechanics and processes to be a part of our curriculum, creating individual interest, ownership and partnerships for study will far out pace any monetary savings we may realize – through benefits to our students and ultimately our community, our state and our nation.
To help us commemorate this day, this facility, our dream of sustainability, we ask for you to please share by taking and planting a tree. Symbolic of putting down our roots, reaching for the heavens, having the ability to flex, bend and still grow in knowledge. (Trees will be available at the front of the building as you leave.)
The educational achievements that our faculty, staff and administration were (and are) leading our children to - was and is phenomenal. Now with this facility, this new tool, the potential and the success of each and every student is truly unlimited.
Thank you.
Deborah H. Miller
Watauga County Board of Education
July 30, 2010
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