Mauldin High School Expected to Benefit From New High School in Fountain Inn

With the commitment to purchase over 61 acres of land in downtown Fountain Inn, Greenville County Schools took a major step toward relieving the problem of overcrowding at Mauldin High School.

The Board of Trustees approved the purchase of the land in their session last Tuesday, with only one dissenting vote. The school is scheduled to open in 2017, but given the boon that it will be economically, Fountain Inn officials are hoping it will be sooner.

In addition to the economic benefit, there will be an educational one for Fountain Inn’s neighbors in Mauldin.

Since the time it was built in 1973, Mauldin High School has often been plagued bv overcrowding. The school was meant to hold 2,000 students and had 1,750 when it opened. Presently, it serves approximately 2,200 students according to principal Ann Miller. At its peak, the school had as many as 2,600.

“There has been a need for a new school in this part of the county for some time,” said Oby Lyles, Communication Director for the district.

According to Board Member Lisa Wells, the new school, which has a working name of New South High School—a reflection of its geography within the county—the decision to go ahead and purchase the land is an indication of the district’s commitment to meet the educational needs of a rapidly expanding area.

“(The site) is based entirely on population numbers,” Wells said.

The next item in the process is to find an architect and begin to accept bids for the design of the property, which was purchased for an estimated $2.1 million.

It is too early to say how many students at Mauldin High School will be transferred to a new school, according to Lyles. Typically, an assignment study is done one year prior to a school’s opening and parents are informed by mail of their children’s school. Given current time frames, such a study would take place in 2016.