Artists at Work
by Katherine Pierpont, Senior Editor

A team of ingenious teachers rolls up their sleeves and turns a rundown temporary school into a magical place their students will never forget.

We should admit now that we didn't have high hopes for Cave Spring Elementary to be one of the more picturesque schools we've visited. But with good reason. This past June, this pre-K-5 school in Cave Spring, Georgia, relocated to a temporary school in nearby Rome because their own school was being remodeled. Their "new" location, formerly the site of Coosa Middle School, had not held up well over the years, as Susan Childers, Cave Spring's principal of 15 years, apologetically explained to us. "But you won't believe what my teachers have done!" she said enthusiastically.

Her eagerness to showcase her teachers' ingenuity at transforming a place she referred to as a dungeon piqued our curiosity -- enough so that a few days later, we were on a plane headed to the small town of Rome, Georgia, located about two hours outside of Atlanta.

Even though the day we visited Cave Spring Elementary was drizzly and dreary, the numerous hanging plants and flowers that festooned the main entrance immediately made things appear bright and cheery. Freshly painted Adirondack chairs sat in front of the school's entrance as if they had been plucked from a lakeside porch. We noted how a storage shed had been cleverly recast as a Cave Spring Elementary school bus using an artistic technique called trompe l'oeil. Surely this was not the "dungeon" we were looking for!

Return of the King. As we entered the main lobby through a maze of ficus trees and hanging ferns, a water fountain quietly gurgled in a corner next to a comfy-looking wicker couch and kid-sized rocking chairs. Books sat in baskets or were neatly filed into colorfully painted bookcases, just waiting to be selected and cozied up with on a couch layered with pillows or a cushy chair in a secluded corner. Well-tended plants sat on every available surface in painted pots. Susan came out of the main office and outstretched her arms. "So," she said, "what do you think?"

We were at a loss, really, considering we were still looking around for the dismal picture of neglect she had written about. "You really have to look closely now," she said. "You just won't believe all they've done."

We took her advice and began to take a closer look at our surroundings when we heard the faint strains of "Love Me Tender" coming from somewhere nearby. When we joked about Elvis being somewhere in the building, Susan pointed in the direction of the Hard Work Café, just steps away from the main office. Cave Spring's teachers have completely transformed the school's former main office into a special sanctuary just for kids. When they want to reward their students, teachers give them permission to spend their free time at the Hard Work Café. From the neon-lighted guitars hanging on the walls to the disco ball and love beads dangling from the ceiling, the Hard Work Café is clearly the place to be. A trio of 1950s-inspired café tables and chairs are situated around the room's showpiece -- an authentic Elvis Presley lamp. "When we first moved in, the carpet in here was badly stained," Susan told us. "Assistant Principal Sara Giannakakis had the neatest idea. In keeping with the 1950s theme, she painted the industrial carpet black and white. The kids just love it!"

Now, keep in mind -- we hadn't even stepped past the main lobby yet.

Get away from it all. As we walked the hallways, Susan pointed out here and there what teachers had done to cover up water damage and rot, where walls and tiles had crumbled and, in some cases, where whole sections of ceiling had fallen out long ago and never been replaced. We marveled at her teachers' creativity -- in one area outside Mrs. Seago's fourth-grade classroom, they had disguised water damage in the ceiling by stapling up blue tulle and creating a jellyfish out of a styrofoam ball cut in half with strips of a tie-dyed T-shirt for tentacles. Mrs. Seago carried this ocean theme into her classroom and made her room into an island getaway complete with a patio umbrella over an overstuffed couch in her reading area, fisherman's nets with shells and starfish hanging on her walls, beach pails full of sand in every corner -- even her projector got in on the act by sporting a grass skirt.

Across the hall, Mr. McLean (whose bright orange fifth-grade classroom featured a giant map of the United States that he had painted on one wall) said it best, "This is the last year some of these kids will be at Cave Spring. We want all of their years here to be memorable -- no matter what."

A second look. The more we walked, the more we understood what Susan had said about having to take a closer look at things. Although their boxes from Cave Spring's original location had been moved in June, the teachers hadn't been able to really start working until a few weeks before the kids were due back. They knew they were facing quite a challenge together, but never once let it steer them away from their goal of making the year away from Cave Spring into an adventure of sorts. Many times their perseverance was tested, as some areas in the temporary location (which they refer to as "Coosa Cave") just seemed beyond repair. For example, throughout the building, many of the bathrooms were missing doors to stalls. Susan and her teachers were stumped on how to fix this situation. Butch Woodward and Sylvia Lowe, the school's custodians, decided to take down the remaining doors and fashioned new ones out of brightly colored fabric hung on old broom and mop handles. "The kids have to get a little creative to get total privacy," Susan said, "but they don't seem to mind."

Finishing touches. Walking through Cave Spring's temporary home, it was hard to believe that the teachers and students had only been here for a few months. A very settled air prevailed at the school, and the students had clearly made themselves right at home. This team of creative thinkers had very easily made a large, industrial school seem cozy with simple touches like beautiful antique dressers that served as displays for student art and storage; table lamps that created a soft, homey light in once drab hallways; and pretty chairs, couches, and donated church pews piled with colorful pillows. Another nice touch we noticed was that wherever we seemed to go, we could hear classical music softly playing. Music was even playing in the library, where librarian Ms. Cox had used colored duct tape to cover the holes in the carpet for a fun-looking striped effect.

As much as Susan Childers and Cave Spring's teachers have grown attached to this location they've made all their own, they're looking forward to returning home to Cave Spring and seeing what a year's worth of remodeling has done for their beloved school. "Our school is getting a huge new wing added with eight classrooms and a total renovation of everything that's existing. So it will be a great big, new school when we get back. And we're excited about that," Susan said.

There's something that editorial director Pat Broderick likes to remind all of us at Teaching K-8 -- and that's her belief that teachers can do anything. Walking the once abandoned and decrepit hallways of Coosa Cave, we were convinced of the truth in that statement now more than ever.