FAQs

Initially launched with several major leadership pledges, the campaign will enter its public phase in January 2021.  To date, $51.6 million has been raised in gifts and commitments toward a projected goal of $52 million.

The scope of work includes four significant building projects (Bellis Athletic Center, Patterson Hall, new Arts Connector and reconfigured/renovated Hall Student Center) as well as significant enhancement to the central quadrangle (The Lawn), additional landscaping and ancillary items such as storm water retention and parking. 

Groundbreaking occurred in May 2020, with occupancy of Patterson Hall in August 2021, and Bellis Athletic Center occupancy in December 2021.

The project could have been be divided into phases, but this would have added substantially to the project cost and not been efficient in terms of construction timing or campus disruption.

The Bellis Athletic Center will primarily support upper school varsity and intramural sports and wellness programs.  Incorporating the stadium grandstand, the Bellis Athletic Center replaces Pierson Gym, and includes both a Competition and an Auxiliary Gym, which combined can be configured into three regulation-size courts when needed. Phillips Gym will be used primarily by the middle school and will provide a fourth court.

The arrangement of the facilities and bleachers greatly enhances accessibility, security and comfort.  A multi-purpose room, weight room and cardio room, as well as an expanded training room and locker room facilities, provide more access for all students. The Competition Gym will have a total capacity for non-athletic events of 1,500 people, which will accommodate the entire student body along with all faculty and staff indoors for the first time in the school's history.

Pembroke Hill has a robust athletic history evidenced by holding the second-highest number of state titles.  And today, 83 percent of upper school students and 77 percent of middle schoolers participate in athletics.

Pools are very expensive to build. Maintenance and staffing would require substantial increases in operating expenses.  Currently, the Pembroke Hill swim team practices at the Paul Henson and Red Bridge pools, which are owned by the YMCA.

With the construction of the Bellis Athletic Center, Pembroke Hill will have the requisite number of locker rooms and ADA compliant restrooms for postseason play.

The building project is addressing a variety of academic needs by providing new and flexible classroom space in the lower level of Patterson Hall that will support a variety of academic programs including robotics, speech and debate and other student activities.  Patterson Hall will also include areas for student/faculty gatherings such as club meetings during a longer lunch period.

The renovated Lawn offers opportunities for outdoor class sessions and small group collaboration. Additionally, the new art gallery will provide increased space where students can showcase their work.

Ultimately, the flexibility of the new spaces will present many opportunities for faculty and students to find creative ways to gather and to enhance the student experience on the Ward Parkway Campus.

The ground floor of Patterson Hall offers additional classroom space.  The area will feature nearly 4,000-square-feet dedicated to academic programs and include a location for Pembroke Hill's nationally-ranked speech and debate program to practice, and floor space for the robotics team to construct and test their robots. Specifically, this lower level will provide a speech and debate classroom with four practice rooms, a robotics classroom, a multi-purpose room and an additional classroom.

The Hall Student Center dining facilities - seating, serving and preparation - were originally sized for a community much smaller than what it is today.  As dining options were significantly enhanced, for example adding a robust salad bar, additional serving space was required. Consequently, each of the four daily student lunch periods is only 25-minutes long.  Because of tight scheduling and service inefficiencies, students spend much of their lunch period waiting in lines.

Current facilities are not flexible; they do not support other activities such as parent meetings, student dances or alumni gatherings.  The current layout of the dining hall and the second-floor auditorium pre-function area does not have restrooms, let alone ones that are accessible.

The larger dining room and serving areas will allow for fewer and longer lunch periods thus offering time for socialization. Operationally, the Patterson Dining Hall will offer increased flexibility in students’ daily schedules; time for students and adults to build relationships; space to accommodate extracurricular student events, such as dances, prom, Science Olympiad and debate tournaments; and alumni events previously held off campus.

The enlarged capacity of the Patterson Dining Hall can accommodate the entire middle school (around 250 students) in one seating, and the upper school (425 students) in two seatings.

A vision for outdoor spaces and landscape on the Ward Parkway Campus was part of the 2016 Ward Parkway Campus Master Plan, which recognized the importance of incorporating the spaces outside the buildings into programming.  With the new Bellis Athletic Center and Patterson Hall, the Ward Parkway Campus will be completely built out, with new buildings facing Ward Parkway and 51^st Street.  

Not visible from outside the campus, the previously raised area between Jordan Hall and Phillips Gym was lowered by about five feet to create a new, enlarged and level Lawn.  It joins all the Ward Parkway Campus buildings, with the new Dining Hall and Terrace forming the fourth enclosing side on the east. In addition, these renovations will create several outdoor classroom areas and gathering places.

Renovations include necessary work to meet current building codes, such as storm water retention.

Parking off 51^st Street behind Hall Student Center will be reconfigured to maximize the number of parking stalls within the available space; there will be no loss of capacity.  Additionally, students and guests can continue to take advantage of other parking areas on campus.

Our goal is to raise the entire amount needed through donations and avoid taking on a mortgage that would likely result in future tuition increases.

There may be a need for short-term “bridge” financing to handle construction costs incurred prior to the receipt of multi-year pledges.

Every family gives for their own reasons.  Here are some that have been compelling:

• You will be able to see the results of your gift every time you drive by on Ward Parkway.  Gifts to fund capital improvements will endure, positively shaping future generations of Pembroke Hill students and families. 
• There is a clear need that cannot be satisfied through operations or annual fundraising.  The school cannot place the full cost of a large-scale capital improvement program into tuition and remain competitive.  Major capital campaigns ensure a strong future.  The business model of Pembroke Hill (as is the case for our peer schools) sets tuition rates to cover school operations with a relatively small provision for routine maintenance of facilities. 
• Current Pembroke Hill families have benefitted from the generosity of past generations and supporting this culture of “giving forward” benefits everyone.  This recalls the Chinese saying: “A community is strong when people plant trees, the shade of which they may never enjoy.”
• Programs supported by improved facilities directly impact the daily student experience, allowing students to learn, interact and develop in an inspiring and uplifting environment.
• Prudent long-term capital planning avoids the need for the school to take on debt, which would inevitably result in higher tuition, substantially decrease operating flexibility and could have a negative impact on future admissions.

Pembroke Hill relies on philanthropic dollars to advance the mission and values of the school. The fundraising priorities for the 2020-21 school year are the Building Together Campaign and the Pembroke Hill Fund, formerly known as the annual giving campaign.

We believe our facilities are currently in good shape; future capital improvement considerations include the installation of artificial turf on the stadium and hockey fields.

Another fundraising goal is to increase the school’s endowment, currently at $48.5 million, which contributes approximately $1.8 million annually to the school’s budget.

The Board has fully endorsed both the building program and the Building Together Campaign; each member has made a personal financial commitment to the campaign.

Current Board member Jonathan Kemper ’71 and past Board president David Kiersznowski are the Building Together Campaign co-chairs. Four key Pembroke Hill stakeholders are serving on the campaign committee, including Jamie Copaken ’93, Jeff Hargroves, Christina Valentine Hogan ’85 and Hunter Wolbach ’93. Additional staff resources have been committed to support the campaign.

To make a gift to the Building Together Campaign, go to Make A Gift. If you have questions about making a gift, please contact John Richardson, director of development, jrichardson@pembrokehill.org, 816-936-1229.

Pierson Gym will be demolished. Current plans are to keep this area a green space, potentially available for sports practices.

The school believes we have a very good relationship with the neighborhood, which has reviewed our plans. We anticipate our neighbors will appreciate the investment in this project and the care taken to minimize the impact on them.

The project is the completion of a master plan spanning decades, which will result in a much more attractive face for the school.  The removal of Pierson Gym will open the view into the campus, and additional attention will be given to beautifying the edges and entrances to the Ward Parkway Campus.  The new facilities will be available for neighborhood homes association annual meetings.

Formal communication programs with the neighborhood (and the City) began with the first neighbors meeting completed on February 19, 2019.

The new facilities will be much more energy efficient than existing buildings. Operating costs (utilities, custodial, insurance) are expected to increase by approximately $275,000.  Provisions will need to be made for the long-term upkeep of the new spaces.

Architects – Gould Evans Associates
Construction Manager – McCownGordon Construction
Landscaping - Tara Armistead

While our new construction will not be LEED certified, our architects, GouldEvans, have incorporated best practices as a design priority in the environmental performance of the project (e.g. high performance shell, high efficiency mechanical systems, generous amounts of daylighting in public and educational spaces).

Security will be improved with a gated entry point on the 51^st Street side of campus, adjacent to a security station (located at the entrance to the Athletic Center), and completely fencing off the Ward Parkway Campus.

The security station will provide a view of all visitors arriving on this side of the campus.

• The construction area will be contained within a fenced area. Construction workers, other than members of their management teams, should not be outside of that perimeter.
• All construction workers will undergo background checks.
• Construction workers will park in an area dedicated to them – near where the batting cages are located now. They will not park in the same lot where students, faculty and parents are parking.
• On-site construction managers will be introduced to Ward Parkway students, faculty and staff.
• A temporary road will provide a separate entrance for construction traffic into the fenced off construction area.
• A security booth at the HSC parking lot will be placed closer to the 51st Street entrance.

 The number of spaces will be reduced in the Hall Student Center (HSC) parking lot during construction. To maximize all PHS available parking, we will encourage students to carpool and to consider public transportation. Street parking may also be required. We ask all members of the school community to be respectful of our neighbors.

The number of marked spaces will increase. However, as cars have routinely been parked in non-marked stalls, the overall parking capacity will remain approximately the same.

During construction, there will be one combined in/out location in the Hall Student Center lot. A separate entrance will be in use for construction traffic.

During construction, we will ask parents to drop off and pick up in the State Line drive.

All construction vehicles should enter and exit the campus on the 51st Street side through a location dedicated to construction traffic. Construction traffic will exit the campus onto 51st Street, turn right and go directly to Ward Parkway. There should not be any construction traffic in the neighborhood, except to access Ward Parkway from the construction entrance. Efforts will be made to avoid deliveries during drop-off and pick-up times.

Access to the campus from the Hall Student Center parking lot will be through a temporary door on the ground level of Hall Student Center. Students will walk through the ground level lobby (Boocock Gallery) to the back door between Hall Student Center and Phillips Gym, and take the outside steps up to the campus.

Once the Lawn was completed, students were able to use sidewalks, staircases and ramps outside of the perimeter of the construction site.  Students and faculty will access the campus from the 51st Street parking lot through the lower level of Hall Student Center.

Access to Pierson Gym will be through Centennial Hall.

There will be a gate and temporary walkway from the HSC parking lot to the athletic field. Construction will be on both sides of the walkway.

Temporary bleachers will be placed on the track for contests. Bleachers will be moved for track practices.

Individuals with limited mobility will find it easiest to access the campus from the State Line drive - entering through the upper and middle school entrances or from the parking lot behind Jordan Hall. Elevators are available in both Jordan Hall and the middle school.

From the Lawn, there will be access to all buildings via sidewalks and ramps.

However, during construction, individuals with limited mobility will find it difficult to go from one floor to the next in Hall Student Center. Because of the age of the building, it has been exempt from ADA codes, but during renovation, an elevator will be installed.

When attending an event in Hall Student Center Auditorium (ground level) or at the athletic field, individuals with limited mobility should access these locations from the Hall Student Center parking lot.

There will be trailers in the construction area near the batting cages for use as offices and storage by our construction partners. No trailers will be used for temporary classrooms.

There are several ways to learn more about the project and to have your questions answered:

• Explore the Building Together microsite, www.pembrokehill.org/buildingtogether
• Send questions to buildingtogether@pembrokehill.org
• Contact John Richardson, director of development, jrichardson@pembrokehill.org, 816-936-1229