PAWTUCKET – The city’s school department received a financial boost from the R.I. Department of Education to help finance a new high school set to be built on the site of McCoy Stadium.
And for those who want to take one last glimpse of the stadium before it is gone for good, you have until the fall to do so.
State-elected and education officials on Wednesday presented the city a $50 million PayGo check, which RIDE officials said will help the city reduce its $330 million bond to finance the new high school’s construction to $280 million. Additionally, the school project, RIDE says, will create $50 million in employment opportunities for local women-owned and minority-owned businesses.
State and local officials on Wednesday also released some early plans for the new high school. The building, which RIDE says is set to be completed by September 2028, will house career and technical education programs, as well as be one of the state’s “green schoolhouses,” making it environmentally friendly.
RIDE spokesperson Victor Morente told PBN on Wednesday that demolition of the 82-year-old minor league baseball stadium, which has sat vacant since the Pawtucket Red Sox moved to Worcester, Mass., in 2021, will begin in the fall, according to the project manager's estimate. From there, construction is expected to start in the summer of 2025, Morente said.
In 2022, city voters
overwhelmingly approved the bond question to build the new high school on the site of McCoy. The new 482,500-square-foot high school will unite the city’s aging Charles E. Shea and William E. Tolman high schools and house approximately 2,200 students.
RIDE and local city officials stated Wednesday that the new high school will be the largest school construction project in the state, surpassing the construction of the new East Providence High School.
“Our students deserve the best educational experience we can give them and we must maintain our commitment to them, and their teachers to further opportunities and engagement in education through better schools and classrooms,” Pawtucket Mayor Donald R. Grebian said in a statement.
James Bessette is the PBN special projects editor, and also covers the nonprofit and education sectors. You may reach him at Bessette@PBN.com. You may also follow him on Twitter at @James_Bessette.
