Hamilton County Schools’ new elementary school in the Hixson area will partner with the North River Family YMCA to create a community hub, county leaders announced Tuesday.
The new school will be built on a shared campus with the North River Family YMCA on Hixson Pike. The partnership will offer additional opportunities to students and families, including expanded after-school program options and swim lessons for every student, Superintendent Justin Robertson said.
The new facility will serve students from the Alpine Crest, DuPont and Rivermont elementary school zones. It is expected to open in fall 2027.
As Hamilton County Schools officials spoke about combining the three elementary schools at the DuPont site, they got a lot of questions around how students were going to make connections, Robertson said. The district heavily emphasizes personalization and ensuring schools are places of belonging for students, and Robertson said he couldn’t think of a better partner than the YMCA to make that happen.
“I hope they get a lot of excitement from it and see the opportunities that it creates for their kids,” he said in an interview. “But it also creates more than that. (It’s) an opportunity for families to connect together. That is an opportunity that we haven’t been able to create in other Hamilton County schools that we really have an opportunity for here.”
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DuPont Elementary and the YMCA are next to each other, but the two properties are largely disconnected. The partnership will turn the space into one campus, Robertson said, and the two facilities will share a gymnasium. Playground and athletic field space will be where the existing school building sits, and a walking trail will wind around the entire property. It will also offer outdoor learning space.
Robertson said the model could be likened to a “community school on steroids.” The district’s community schools partner with a community organization to connect students and their families with the resources and support they need to thrive.
Hamilton County Mayor Weston Wamp said the partnership came out of a desire to connect the DuPont Elementary site and YMCA in a way that would serve children, parents and staff.
“Every elementary parent I’ve ever talked to from every community in this county — no matter whether they come from the political left or the political right — every one of them wants their child moving around,” he said during the press conference. “It’s probably the single thing every single parent agrees with is the pursuit of academic excellence and physical health and fitness is a beautiful combination.”
New Hixson area elementary school to partner with YMCA
The announcement comes as the YMCA of Metropolitan Chattanooga prepares to expand and renovate its North River branch in order to add new space, services and amenities. The $7 million project is set to begin early next year.
The Hamilton County school board approved building the new elementary school on the DuPont Elementary site in November 2024. Construction is scheduled to start in fall 2026, and the project is being funded with $48 million from the county’s facilities bond.
School district leaders toured a YMCA partnership school near Louisville, Kentucky, as inspiration for the collaboration. At that school, the partnership allowed students to participate in yoga, karate classes and related arts activities that Hamilton County Schools can’t provide in a typical school setting, Robertson said.
“It just really created a broader opportunity for kids to connect to things that they’re interested in,” he said.
Andrew Terry, the principal of Norton Commons Elementary in Kentucky, said the school’s partnership with the local YMCA has been great. Similar to the plan in Hamilton County, his school and the YMCA are on the same campus with a shared gymnasium.
The school hosts a fall festival for the community with the YMCA, he said, and the YMCA provides swim lessons to the school’s second graders, as well as its classes for students with disabilities.
When he was the principal at other schools, Terry said, he would typically have to find outside organizations or teachers to sponsor clubs or extracurricular activities, but at Norton Commons those largely run through the YMCA. The offerings have ranged from cooking classes to flag football, and either the school or YMCA provides scholarships to students who can’t afford the activities, he said.
“It provides such an incredible opportunity for our students,” he said by phone. “We are offering things, I think, that are unique to our school because of the partnership with the Y.”
Contact education reporter Shannon Coan at scoan@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6396.