Watch now: West Ridge High School marking its first year

BLOUNTVILLE — The last throes and aftermath of a COVID-19 pandemic might not seem like the best to to launch and operate a new $75 million high school of 1,900 students.It is among the largest high schools in Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia.However, sometimes in adversity people work to overcome problems and make them opportunities, and the result, according to the head of the largest school system in the region, was the first new Sullivan County Schools high school in 42 years.Sullivan County Director of Schools Evelyn Rafalowski said the first year for West Ridge High School, the consolidation of the former Sullivan North, Sullivan South and Sullivan Central high school, so far has turned out great.The last new high schools were North and South, which opened in 1980."It's gone great to be honest with you," Rafalowski said recently when asked about the first year of the school, which in May will have its first graduation in a school year of firsts that include the 6A Wolves football team making the playoffs.BUMPS ALONG THE WAYOf course there were some bumps along the way.Originally, the school off Exit 63 of Interstate 81 at 380 Lynn Road, was to have opened earlier. However, a delay in final approval linked to some opposition to the project even though site preparation was all but done, a wet building season and COVID-19 delayed the project.After the project was all but complete, the originally ribbon cutting scheduled for August was postponed because of rain.At that same time, a sinkhole or "dropout" appeared on the West Ridge track around the football field, delaying the surfacing of that until this month.An ongoing issue is access. The county Highway Department widened, repaved and improved its section of Lynn Road, and Kingsport also repaved sections of Lynn and other roads leading to the school.Shortly after the school year started, a school bus rear-ended a student-driven vehicle, but no one was injured.The school system is working to get a secondary access to and from Henry Harr Road, and it bought property directly across the front entrance of the school that somebody could be used as a new access road going by and behind Second Harvest Food Bank, which is in the old Sam's Wholesale Club building.NAMESAKE BUILDINGAthletics is a huge interest for Rafalowski, who taught physical education and coached in the school system starting in 1980 before become an assistant principal and going to central office in 1999.She also has been involved with West Ridge from the get go, first on the staff of former Director Jubal Yennie when he got facilities studies going and completed, looking at the best path forward for a school system with too much space and space not in the needed areas of the county..After he set a plan in motion for high school and middle school consolidations including the building of West Ridge and Sullivan East Middle, he resigned to move to Wyoming to take a job there. The school board named Rafaliowski interim and not long thereafter permanent director.When she retired the first time, she became a consultant for West Ridge while David Cox, who was chosen director in 2019, headed the school system. After he retired after two years she again became an interim director before agreeing to become a permanent one again. In honor of her work on and for West Ridge, the building that houses the West Ridge basketball gyms is being named for Rafalowski.HIGHLIGHTS SO FARAmong other highlights of the year, select pupils at the school got to become student ambassadors, guiding visitors through the facility.One of the first-year Student Ambassadors is Kaitlyn Lemmons, a Sullivan North High student who made the transition to West Ridge and will be part of the first graduating class from there in May 2022."Everything we do at West Ridge is so special and unique in its own way," said Kaitlyn, who plans to study nursing at East Tennessee State University or the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.The cheerleader, also HOSA president and a member of the Key Club, Beta Club and Pep Club, said North was a great school but that West Ridge offers more programs of study than North or Sullivan South and Sullivan Central could.In addition, feathers in the cap for West Ridge included:• Senior Cooper Johnson was named a Roan Scholar at East Tennessee State University. The honor includes a four-year scholarship at ETSU in Johnson City plus enrichment trips and activities in the summers.• Students Bethanie Haga, a junior, and Allison Bennett, a senior, won in the Barter Theatre's 20th annual Young Playwrights Festival. Bethanie's one-act play, 'The Robbery,' won second place, and Allison's one-act play, 'Surprise,' earned honorable mention, put it in the top seven.• Career technical education teacher Sally Shipley received the first Leader of the Wolves student award for the week of Sept. 27 through Oct. 1, the first time it had been given. The tourism and hospitality instructor also was nominated for and received the Kingsport Times News Teacher Spotlight recognition via a nomination by West Ridge Principal Josh Davis.• History teacher Thomas Gilbert also received the Times News Teacher Spotlight award and was chosen the school's Teacher of the Year.• The Board of Education held its first meeting at the school, in the auditorium, Feb. 4 and approved a $150,000 donation from the J.A. Street family for a video scoreboard to be in place at the football field well in advance of the fall football season.Principal Josh Davis said the rest of the $230,000 scoreboard cost, $80,000, was raised from other donations and work by the West Ridge athletic boosters. The school's audio visual productions students, taught by Jason Sanderford, will do video of football, including for the scoreboard, and already are doing it for basketball. • The ribbon cutting, delayed from August because of rain, occurred Nov. 11 and included a Veterans Day tribute, as well as a visit from former school board member Jerry Greene of Bristol. Greene and former board member Dan Wells of Kingsport were among school board members who supported the school.FIRST-YEAR LEGACYIn years to come, the legacy of West Ridge will grow, but the first year, warts and all, never can be repeated.At the Nov. 11 ribbon cutting, students said you can't readily tell which students were North Golden Raiders, South Rebels and Central Cougars "We are unified as one. We are West Ridge," Student Body President Gracie Olinger said at the ribbon cutting, which was followed by an open house."It's hard to pick who was a (Sullivan Central High) Cougar, who was a (Sullivan North) Raider and who was a (South) Rebel," said football player Fletcher Gibson, a senior who went to South until this school year."When we started out, I was not into it. I wanted to stay at South," said Fletcher, who like Gracie and Benjamin Novak served on the school naming committee. "Coming to know the football team is like introducing a whole new family into my life."Some adults agreed."I had a vision of what this could be. It turned out so much better," Sullivan County school board Vice Chairman Michael Hughes said of the $75 million school.Rafalowski, who was a consultant for West Ridge and the new Sullivan East Middle in the time between being director, quoted President Abraham Lincoln, saying the best way to predict the future is to create it.And county Mayor Richard Venable paraphrased an old saying about a house not being a home until the family lives there by saying, "A building is not a school until the family moves in."The West Ridge Wolves, it seems, are at home on Lynn Road.Try the Kingsport Times News app today. Download here from Google Play and the App Store.