Building Community Case Statement
Mission Statement
At Applewild we believe that the ages of five to fifteen are the most important in a child’s education, the foundation upon which all further education is built. Here students discover their passion for learning and engage in the pursuit of excellence in academics, arts, and athletics in a supportive environment. The core values we promote and the relationships among all the members of our community prepare our students to be confident learners and responsible citizens.
Needs
As part of our Long Range Planning process, incorporating recommendations from our re-accreditation process and leading into our fiftieth celebrations, Applewild identified a series of needs. Our needs include:
• Increased endowment both to assure that faculty and staff children
can affordably consider Applwild as an option and to increase outreach to our
diverse population.
• Affordable faculty housing as an inducement to attract outstanding faculty to the
school.
• Key facilities needs that are central to our program:
o A modern dining hall and kitchen to seat and provide meals for each division;
o A new Wood Shop for our power tools program;
o New space for our award winning music program.
Progress to date
Endowment growth has attracted significant leadership support. This will provide increased and steady support for our families through our financial aid program, and to our faculty through professional development and through the enhanced financial aid program we offer their families.
Generous support has allowed us to open our remodeled Wood Shop this fall, relocated to an attractive existing building most recently used for storage. Our completely remodeled faculty apartment housing, accomplished in 2007-2008, is being used to good effect. Focusing on the housing and educational needs of faculty and staff were key to our goals, and we are delighted to have met those so successfully.
The Plan for the Future
To address our facilities needs, we have developed plans for a more efficient campus footprint. We envision a campus with a central kitchen and dining room which will serve lunch to all students in two sittings. Family style lunches at Applewild are central to the school’s culture and climate. They reinforce our core values and our curriculum. Students read poems, share birthday announcements, answer geography questions, play instruments, and conduct science experiments. Faculty assure collegiality and age appropriate attention to nutrition. Our meals together truly build community. Looking ahead to a reconfigured K – 8 school, we will still be too large to sit one division in our existing space, and our Crocker kitchen, originally built in 1911, cannot be materially improved.
As careful stewards of our community’s resources, we will build an energy efficient building that combines functionality, careful use of site, and aesthetic value. It will be located to assure future development opportunities, including space for choral and instrumental music, that will further tie the campus together.
Building Community Campaign
Applewild is pleased to announce early success. We have met our faculty housing and endowment goals and have received a major gift toward the Wood Shop. Under the leadership of the Head of School and the Board of Trustees, we seek to conclude our campaign by funding a new facility. Funds raised in this phase will primarily support the following objectives:
• A new dining facility to serve all students, faculty, and staff in two comfortable seatings;
• A modern kitchen equipped to assure nutrition goals.
Projected Costs and Timing
Maintaining institutional momentum is particularly vital in challenging times. In recognition of the generous response from our leadership and in affirmation of our belief in the future, we therefore seek your support to complete the campaign. The $7,500,000 Building Community Campaign includes:
I. New Dining Facility $ 4,600,000
II. Faculty Housing Renovations $ 700,000
III. Wood Shop Relocation and Renovation $ 200,000
IV. Endowment for Faculty Support and Financial Aid $ 2,000,000
Total: $ 7,500,000
Commitments in advance of public launch: $ 6,001,900
We are pleased to announce the attainment of our endowment and housing goals and a major gift toward the funding of the Wood Shop. Our public launch in the fall of 2009 seeks to complete the funding for the Dining Hall facility. The campaign is expected to continue through 2011, with pledges collected over three to five years. We intend to broaden the base of support for Applewild, in part by setting participation goals for all constituencies. In support of this goal, we have added staff to the Development Office to focus on nurturing our alumni.
Applewild was founded with the vision of providing an excellent education for area residents in a school with heart. It has met this goal with extraordinary success for over fifty years thanks to the commitment of devoted faculty and loyal families. For Applewild to continue to serve students and families in the next fifty years as well as it has in its first fifty, we ask for your support to meet key needs that will have both immediate and long lasting benefit for our program and our students.