PYEONGTAEK, South Korea — The Daegu American School in South Korea will put its high school in a building of its own with space for 500 students, the Army said Thursday.
The Army will do it by renovating an old three-story barracks at Camp Walker, converting it into what will be called the Walker High School. Plans also call for renovating a dining hall at Walker to make it the high school’s cafeteria.
Work is scheduled to start in late May and finish in August 2011, with the school opening in time for the 2011-2012 school year, said Philip A. Molter, spokesman for the U.S. Army Garrison-Daegu.
"Daegu has grown faster than anyone anticipated, and because we’re getting more families, we need more school capacity," Molter said.
The Daegu American School is currently at Camp George, about a half-mile from Walker, and serves grades K–12, with room for 725 students. That school will change to a K-8 school when the Walker High School opens, and Walker will accommodate grades 9-12.
The $9.9 million project will involve renovating two buildings at Walker: S-330, the vacant three-story barracks, and S-338, the Daegu Mountain Inn dining hall.
Putting the high school in its own spot at Walker is only an interim step, said Molter. The Army plans eventually to build two new schools in Daegu, part of a larger effort to develop its installations in the region as one of the two hubs into which its forces in South Korea will eventually be consolidated. The other hub is in Pyeongtaek.
Construction dates for the new schools have yet to be set, but the plan is to have them open by 2020, Molter said.
