Legion to open permanent Rock Hill site. We got an early look. Here’s what we saw.
Two years ago, Legion Collegiate Academy principal TK Kennedy was tasked with getting students to enroll in Rock Hill’s newest public charter school — one with an odd day-to-day schedule, an explicit emphasis on athletics and a permanent campus that hadn’t yet been built.
He still has that task. And he will continue to as long as he’s Legion’s principal.
But next month, that task will likely become a lot easier.
Kennedy told The Herald during an exclusive tour of the Lancers’ almost-finished, new campus last week that Legion plans to welcome students into its permanent site as early as February. Though no date is not set in stone — the South Carolina Office of School Facilities has to give its final approval sometime in the coming weeks — the news is an important and long-awaited milestone for Legion, which has spent its first 17 months of its existence at a temporary site off Bird Street in Rock Hill.
The purpose Legion serves is a unique and multi-faceted one, Kennedy said: Class sizes are smaller than those at traditional public schools, and the school’s non-traditional schedule allows students to spend less time in a classroom and more time on an athletics court or field or at a training facility.
And now that the Lancers soon will have a permanent home? That vision might be even more compelling to families in York, Chester and Lancaster counties, Kennedy said.
“Every human being understands what I just said,” Kennedy told The Herald. “The only thing stopping them is, ‘Where do I do it? Like, I know what you’re saying, but where can I do it?’ And now we have that place.
“Now, we got a place to do what we say we want to do. Part of that is building a culture. It’s hard to build a culture when you’re not home.”
An inside look at Legion’s home
Legion’s new site, which is tucked behind a line of trees that separates it from S.C. Highway 901 in Rock Hill, is one contiguous building with an athletic wing and an academic wing.
In the athletic wing, there’s a gym with glass backboards and navy blue seats with teal “LCA’‘ lettering installed. Behind that, there are several coaches offices, a weight room, locker rooms and a training room with a whirlpool. Also under construction is a practice field, which sits adjacent to the student parking lot.
In the academic wing, there are 16 classrooms — a handful of which are designed for biology and chemistry labs, and all of which have the capabilities for SMART Boards.
And then at the front of the school, in addition to the administrators’ offices, there’s the student union, which will have diner-style booths installed along its walls and will include a concession stand. There’s not a conventional cafeteria, but Kennedy said the school plans to welcome local “guest restaurants” into the student union, so they can serve a limited assortment of their menu options.
At full capacity, Legion will have 600 students enrolled, but only 300 students will be in classrooms at one time because of the school’s non-traditional schedule.
“You see how big the school is,” Kennedy said. “It’s not that big. But for 300 kids? It’s huge.”
The school, on an 83-acre site with an official address of 3090 Long Meadow Road, will likely play off a “castle” theme, Kennedy said: The student union will be called the “roundtable”; the halls will be polished but look unfinished and “medieval-ish”; and the school’s decorations will likely resemble the school’s “Lancers” mascot.
There’s also no bus loop, as the dual enrollment charter doesn’t provide busing.
What’s next for the Rock Hill public charter?
Furniture not currently used at Trinity Bible Church, the temporary site, is planned to arrive Jan. 25. Students might only be able to occupy the academic wings and the weight rooms when they first move in, depending on the construction progress of the school’s gym, Kennedy said.
In addition to what’s almost finished now, Legion announced its plan for a 33-acre athletic complex in September that’ll serve as the student-athletes’ “home turf.” Those facilities, The Herald previously reported, will include five practice fields and four lighted game fields for football, baseball, softball, soccer and lacrosse. Fundraising efforts are ongoing, but the baseball and softball fields are the school’s top facilities priority, Kennedy said.
Having a home turf is uniquely important to Legion, beyond the fact that it just adds to the school’s prestige and sense of home: The school in its second academic year has drawn criticism from those who think it has tried to recruit the best athletic talent from schools in York County, and as a result, its athletic department has sometimes had a difficult time renting facilities to play games and finding teams who’ll play the Lancers, The Herald has previously reported.
“I think what the saving grace of what really made this thing work, I’m just being honest, is the parents and the kids,” Kennedy said. “There’s no way that if they didn’t have the flexibility that they had that we could’ve pulled this off. They were so understanding and so appreciative of what we were doing and where we were moving.”
This story was originally published January 20, 2021 at 1:02 PM.
.jpeg)