We Cherish This Building!

Detail of D'Hannis Brick Patterns at North Elementary Entrance

Article by JULIE SILVA in the Mid-Valley Town Crier Newspaper Regarding a Mata+Garcia Architects Elementary School Project in Mercedes, Texas. 

MERCEDES — Mercedes ISD trustees got a look at construction progress in the expansion of North Elementary at a workshop last week.

"We cherish this building," Mercedes Independent School District Superintendent Daniel Treviño said. "It's our newest building, serving first through fifth grades."  A construction crew is building six additional classrooms and Treviño hopes to turn North Elementary into a middle school that serves sixth through eighth grades in 2014. The gym will be turned into a band hall and a new gym will be constructed, he said.

Also Monday, trustees recognized a plaque mounted at the school four years after it was constructed. The plaque, which lists the names of the school board and superintendent on board during the school's construction, first was commissioned in 2009 when the school opened, but it was lost in changes in staffing over the years and only recently resurfaced.

Former Superintendent Walter Watson, who headed the district at the time, was invited to the event as an honored guest. Retired from the district, Watson said he's found himself working with children again, but he still misses Mercedes ISD