SARTELL -- Staff at Oak Ridge Elementary are preparing for district wide changes starting this summer.

After this school year, Oak Ridge Elementary will go from a K-4th grade building to the Oak Ridge Early Learning Center for Pre-K and Kindergarten students.

Principal Jason Mielke says they've had a lot of internal conversation on how to utilize the space to make it a successful learning environment for younger students.

That's one of the things we are looking forward to next year, the ability to have different spaces that we can used in different ways to offer kids more opportunities.

Mielke says they are still working on classroom layouts for the early childhood and kindergarten programs.

He says while the building was originally design to accommodate younger students, there is still some adjustments they need to figure out before the fall.

Even small things like are our 3-year-old's going to be able to pull certain paper towel dispensers or heights of furniture, so we are making those minor adjustments and appropriately mapping out parts of our building.

This is also a big transition for parents who are either new to the district or have never had a student go to Oak Ridge before.

Mielke says parents are encouraged to take advantage of the Pre-K registration on Monday from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. and Kindergarten registration on Tuesday from 5:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m., to tour the facility and ask questions to help make the change as smooth as possible.

Other changes this fall include the former Sartell High School becoming the new middle school, the current middle school will be the Riverview Intermediate School, and Pine Meadow Elementary will house the district's 1st and 2nd grade students.

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Oak Ridge Elementary

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