SCHOOLS DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY BREAKS GROUND ON NEW SCHOOL IN ELIZABETH

ELIZABETH - The New Jersey Schools Development Authority (SDA) today joined Elizabeth Public Schools, along with city officials, at a groundbreaking ceremony for the new Joseph Battin School No. 4. This new educational facility will help reduce districtwide overcrowding while supporting hundreds of construction and other jobs throughout the project duration.

"The construction of another new school in Elizabeth will provide much needed relief for the widespread overcrowding experienced in the school district," said Manuel Da Silva, SDA Chief Executive Officer. "The State's investment in school facilities like this represents our commitment to providing every student with the classroom spaces they need to learn and succeed. Today's groundbreaking ceremony marks not only the beginning of construction, but the beginning of building a brighter educational experience for Elizabeth students. We appreciate our ongoing partnership with Elizabeth Public Schools, city, and state officials as we advance this important project."

"We are excited to once again welcome the New Jersey Schools Development Authority back to the Elizabeth community to break ground on our newest elementary school that is replacing a school that served Elizabeth students at all grade levels during its more than 100-year history," said Elizabeth Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Olga Hugelmeyer. "Over the past two decades, the SDA has been a vital partner in helping to modernize our school community by adding a dozen new school buildings to a large collection of schools that are more than a century old. These newly constructed schools have been significant in both providing state-of-the-art amenities to students from early childhood through high school and addressing the issue of dramatically increased student enrollment. Elizabeth Public Schools thanks and expresses its gratitude to the SDA for their ongoing support and we look forward to welcoming this wonderful new school to our learning community."

The new school will be an approximately 146,000 square-foot facility designed to educate up to 1,068 students in prekindergarten through eighth grade. In addition to classrooms, the school will include a vocal music room, an instrumental lesson room, an art room with a kiln, three science labs, a media center, a cafeteria, a multi-purpose room, and a gymnasium.

Once complete, this $101.5 million school will be the fifteenth capital project completed by the SDA in Elizabeth since the inception of the school construction program. The SDA previously invested more than $494 million in completed projects in Elizabeth.

The construction of this new school project is advancing a design-build approach. The design-build method differs from a traditional design-bid-build approach by allowing the SDA to contract with one firm for both design and construction of a school facilities project. Terminal Construction Corporation is the design-build contractor for the project. As part of the design-build contract, Terminal Construction Corporation is working with DMR Architects, Inc., on the design. Accenture Infrastructure and Capital Projects, LLC, is managing the project.

As a result of SDA's commitment to building energy-efficient buildings that consider the surrounding environment, this school will be built with the goal of achieving LEED (United States Green Building Council - Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Silver certification.

An early site preparation contract, completed in 2025, allowed for abatement, demolition, and site preparation activities at the site of the former Joseph Battin School No. 4. This initial site work prepared the site for construction of the new school.

The SDA is the State agency responsible for fully funding and managing the new construction, modernization and renovation of school facilities projects in 31 SDA Districts. Its current portfolio of active projects is valued at approximately $2 billion - including the Capital Project portfolio, emergent projects and Regular Operating District grants. Since the program's inception, the SDA has provided funding for and management oversight of 900 completed school facilities projects in SDA Districts and has executed more than 5,400 grants for Regular Operating Districts throughout the State of New Jersey. For more information about the SDA, please visit our website at: Facebook; Instagram; LinkedIn; or Twitter.