After years of planning and preparation, Goodpasture is estimated to begin construction on a new addition to its campus this spring. The building will hold new facilities that can be used by everybody on campus.
“Plans are for a multipurpose facility that will serve the whole school community,” high school principal Dr. Amanda Binkley said. “What will be great for our high school students is the 14 classrooms in this new building that are going to be for high school and learning lab use.”
Ten of these classrooms are going to be for regular high school classes, while the other four will be used for the learning lab.
“Right now we have a lot of people on top of each other,” Dr. Binkley said. “We just need more space.”
The high school classes being split between two buildings is meant to mimic a college campus.
“We want our high school students to have a college prep styled experience,” Goodpasture president Dr. Jeff Bixenman said. “And this is going to prepare them for college with them being able to go back and forth between both buildings.”
Alongside the new classes, there will also be a fifty-yard indoor practice facility.
“Football, soccer, band, and cheer can use it,” Dr. Binkley said. “They can use it in the elementary school for P.E.. We can also use it for indoor practice when it’s pouring down rain outside.”
The new facility will also provide a lounge area for students to use.
“It’ll be a place for seniors to eat lunch, and for students to study in the afternoon, or during intervention,” Dr. Binkley said.
On top of the new installations the building has to offer, it will also hold a new wrestling room and wrestling locker room.
“Our wrestling team is getting bigger, and they’re having a lot of success,” Dr. Binkley said. “But they’ve outgrown every space we’ve got for them.”
Construction is expected to start in the spring of this year; however, the building isn’t estimated to be opened until the start of the 2027-2028 school year.
The building will be built where the blacktop currently sits. The playground will be torn down and rebuilt next to the new building, with turf instead of mulch.
“There will be a big play structure in the middle of the new playground,” Dr. Bixenman said. “We are going to be the only school in Tennessee that has this structure.”
All in all, the total cost of the new facility will be around $12,000,000.
“Dr. Bixinman has done what he does best, and he’s raised enough money so that we can have ground moving this year,” Dr. Binkley said.
In January 2024, the school hired Collier Engineering to develop a campus masterplan for the school.
“They spoke to a lot of people on campus and looked at the layout of all the buildings and the enrollment trends,” Dr. Bixenman said. “They told us we need a central location for the learning lab, a practice spot for our wrestling team, an indoor practice area for P.E. classes and athletic teams, and an updated playground.”
Developing a master plan was part of Goodpasture’s five-year plan.
“When we are ready, there are other projects in that pipeline. That plan can take us out for the next 20 to 30 years,” Dr. Binkley said. “When we get ready to build a new elementary building or football stadium, we know where it’s gonna go.”
When deciding what to put in the new building, a feasibility study was conducted.
“We interviewed our donor base to see not only what they thought we needed, but what they would financially contribute to,” Dr. Binkley said. “This idea of a multipurpose facility that would serve both athletics and academics kept coming up as the greatest need.”
Artist renderings and the architectural plans were shared with students during devotional on Feb. 6.
