Bethel Park says goodbye to NAMS
With enthusiasm, Jocelyn Stein and Charlotte Crawley greeted visitors to Neil Armstrong Middle School.
“Welcome to NAMS’s final mission,” they said as they opened the glass doors to the building that had educated Bethel Park “tweeners” since 1970.
Both recently completed sixth grade and will enter Independence Middle School (IMS) in the fall. However, nobody will attend NAMS ever again as the school along with five elementary buildings in the district are closing for good.
Stein and Crawley admitted they were sad that the building wouldn’t be used anymore but they were thrilled their teachers are moving to IMS with them. While they attended different grammar schools (Memorial and Abraham Lincoln respectively) they acknowledged NAMS holds a special place in their hearts.
“My fondest memory was the first day of school and meeting all my friends,” Stein said.
“We kind of just became good friends,” added Crawley.
She added that she’ll long remember the last day of school. “That’s when all the buses go to leave and the teachers stand and wave to you,” she said. “I don’t know if they’ll do that at IMS.”
NAMS, however, had one long goodbye.While the last day of class was June 4, NAMS said farewell to the community on June 3 when alumni and citizens walked the hallways during a Final Bell goodbye. The open house attracted approximately 275 former students.
“I love all the ramps and the nooks and grannies,” said Lisa Stugan, who has been a custodian in the building for the past two years. “They said the new school has some nice surprises.”
Isabella Nath and Vivian Piccolino found one of those spaces and reflected upon their days at NAMS.
“It’s basically a place where people can chill. A calming area for kids. Sometimes I study here,” said Nath, who is a member of the Class of 2032.
“There’s a lot of good memories here,” added Piccolino, who sat with Nath in the area tucked along a ramp leading up to the classrooms. “Probably just meeting new people and making new friends,” she added of her best memories.
After they left their respective elementary schools (George Washington and William Penn), Emma Bucheli and Samantha Degore forged a lasting friendship during their time at NAMS. As they scribbled their names on a bulletin board so as to be remembered, they recalled the movies they watched and the games like Four Square they played.
Middle school years are important and crucial and they noted how they weathered them “because of the friendship” they made. “We are still friends,” they noted.
While the magnitude of the event was overwhelming for Brandon Sperling and Matt Gibala, they were underwhelmed by their surroundings.
“It’s a lot smaller than I remember,” said Gibala, who is a police officer for the city of Pittsburgh.
“Just going back in time and looking at what was and the way we used to be at a young age. It just amazes me how it’s coming to an end here,” Sperling said.
Just as Sperling and Gibala were thumbing through memorabilia in the NAMS cafeteria, Kristen Kane was showing her children, Maddie and Lily, as well as her brother, Zachary, photos of her sixth-grade yearbook. She attended NAMS for fifth and sixth grade in 2000 and 2001.
Kane noted she was in the first class when they took fifth grade out of the elementary school.
“This was a wonderful school and we settled in pretty well. I loved the small, close-knit community we had here.”
In September, 1,800 students from kindergarten through fifth grade will enter a new three-story elementary center. The $134 million building will have two grades per level. Each floor will also have its own principal, nurse and guidance counselor.
The school will replace Abraham Lincoln, which opened in 1965; Benjamin Franklin (1956); George Washington (1966); Memorial (1949); and William Penn (1962) elementary schools and reduce the district’s building to three, including IMS and the high school.
“I disagree with the new elementary center,” Kane said. “I think that the neighborhood schools are what made Bethel special, and it’s sad to see all those memories go away. I think having an elementary center is a disservice to our kids, but, you have to change with the times. It’s just hard.”
Lisa Miracle-Volpe acknowledges change is difficult. She served as NAMS principal for two-and-a-half years. She assumes a similar position at the elementary center in the fall.
“Change is hard but it’s necessary. It wouldn’t have been easy no matter how it happened,” she said. “Eventually, they all close and we have to open new buildings or renovate or do things differently.”
Miracle-Volpe that closing all the buildings at the same time was a “nice way to tie off a lot of tradition” and that one big change might have been easier than a lot of little alterations over many years.
According to Miracle-Volpe, moving fifth grade back to the elementary school and sixth grade to the middle school was perhaps the best modification to the district’s system.
“I love the fact that we’re separating 5 and 6 now. It’s tricky. I come from always knowing that the oldest students in the school are the hardest students, whether they’re 4th graders, 6th graders, 8th graders. They become the big dogs. The behaviors are greater in the oldest group, no matter how old they are, and what the configuration is of the school.”
At NAMS, she loved that it was different because there were only two grades. “They act differently, but you don’t get that big dog mentality when you’re only somewhere for two years. So I just love that about this building specifically, that fifth and sixth grade together works so well.
“I like the fifth grade’s going back to the elementary level. I do think they are still elementary students. So I think they’re going to the right place. We’ll let them be the big dogs there”
Elena Kowalski’s daughter, Lillie, will be one of those big dogs. She will be a fifth grader at the new elementary center.
Kowalksi attended the Final Bell event at NAMS with her lifelong friend, Randi Fedella. Both went to Abraham Lincoln and attended NAMS from 2005 to 2006.
“Compared to elementary school, NAMS was very big and a huge adjustment but it’s kind of a sad thing to see all these building go, but I am excited to see what’s in the future,” Kowalski said.
“It’s exciting because I get to actually go through the process because of my own daughter. It’s going to be interesting to see how they arrange everything and going into a new building.”