Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools hosted an open house on May 19 for alumni to visit Chapel Hill High School, before the building is torn down during the construction process.
The event was designed to allow alumni to revisit classrooms, walk through the halls and reminisce. In addition, the architecture firm in charge of the construction, Moseley Architects, had representatives on site to answer questions and discuss the plans for the new school building.
“Chapel Hill High School is significant to many, many people. The building has been here since 1966, so thousands and thousands of graduates are a part of this community, so we thought it was important to invite them back,” assistant superintendent Todd LoFrese said.
Becky Green graduated from Chapel Hill in 1985 and was glad that the district decided to hold an open house. “I just wanted to see if I remembered what everything looked like and to see what it felt like to enter the halls again,” Green said.
Married couple Matt Tyndall and Cindy Parsons, who graduated in 1973 and attended the event, feel especially attached to the school because it is where they met.
“We fell in love back in the spring of ‘73 before we graduated, so we wanted to come back,” Tyndall said.
Parsons wishes that the school would hold a fundraiser where alumni could buy small parts of the torn down building.
“It would be kind of fun if they had some sort of deal where you could buy bricks or things like that. I was at a school one time that was going to be torn down, and they actually made a lot of money on that,” Parsons said.
William Slade attended the event because he taught at Chapel Hill as the Special Populations Coordinator for 34 years, from 1974-2008. He feels positive about the new school building.
“I think [the reconstruction project] is progress. It is still a nice facility, but, if you can do better, do better,” Slade said.
