Academy of Environmental Science needs structural repairs to stay open next school year | Local News

Currently, it’s the Academy of Environmental Science (AES) in Crystal River that’s in peril.

While there isn’t a wrecking ball ready to knock it down to make way for a waterside resort – it’s deeded to remain a place of education – the 40-something-year-old strange-looking building is in need of structural repair.

The first phase of repairs began last summer.

However, during the construction, damage to the elevator shaft was discovered, adding more than $275,000 in unexpected costs for AES, which drained their reserve budget.

Over the next few years, the remaining repairs are anticipated to cost $750,000. Approximately $350,000 is required for phase two of the project, which has to be completed by the summer of 2023.

That means, in order for the phase two repairs to be completed before students return in 2023, funding must be secured by February 2023, said Michelle Leeper, AES board of directors’ chairwoman.

If that doesn’t happen, the school will not be able to open for the 2023-24 school year.

“We’ve spent $700,000 in the past 10 years making constant repairs just to maintain,” Leeper said. “We’ve painted, replaced the A/C and other things, but this is major construction that’s needed, and because the building is more than 40 years old, the codes are different now.

“So, when we make these repairs, they have to be brought up to code, and that’s expensive,” she said, “but it’s necessary. It’s also a good thing, because it will make it better than when it was originally constructed.”

The building itself is difficult to describe.

“People stop by all the time; they’re not sure what it is,” said Ernie Hopper, AES principal. “They ask, ‘Is this a museum? Do you rent kayaks?’”

Originally, it was built as condominiums for retired barbershop quartet members, a series of units that are now classrooms, up on stilts, surrounded by a catwalk and topped with white, metal, hat-shaped roofs.

At one point, it was turned over to the Florida Communities Trust (FCT), a Florida land acquisition grant program administered by the Department of Community Affairs (DCA).

In 1998, it was deeded to the city of Crystal River, and the nonprofit, tuition-free, public charter school opened in 1999.

“Back in the ‘90s, I was with a group called the Friends of the Nature Coast Marine Environmental Science Center, and we formed to support the Marine Science Station … but the main focus was to acquire the property that the academy is on now,” said Tim Hess, the group’s founding president. “We wrote a grant for $600,000 from the state (Florida Communities Trust), and we got it.”

The school sits on the Salt River, about halfway down Fort Island Trail. If you’re headed toward the beach at the end of the trail, AES is on the right, just past Shrimp Landing.

“The location makes a perfect lab for our teachers to utilize, and the teachers and the students all want to be there,” Hopper said.

Imagine kayaking or canoeing as your P.E. class activity, paddling in waters where manatees and dolphins swim. Or learning about ecology or marine biology by exploring the estuaries and the river.

“It’s great for nature buffs,” said former AES student Jacob Leeper, now 33. “I have memories of canoe trips and hikes; I was in Boy Scouts and enjoyed being outdoors. What I really loved was doing dissections – sharks and frogs, fish, starfish, aquatic animals.

“It was great because when I was at the school we had block scheduling, longer class periods so we had the time to do the dissections and then write up the (reports),” he said, adding that one takeaway from that time that he uses today as an adult is being able to focus, to start a task and keep at it until it’s completed.

Jacob’s mother, Michelle, joined the AES board when Jacob first started attending the school.

“We had homeschooled during middle school, and by then he was really interested in the sciences,” Michelle Leeper said. “We found out about the academy and that it was tuition-free … and he loved it there. He wanted to go even on days he was sick, that’s how much he loved it.

“When he started, they made every parent aware they had open board meetings and I started going,” she said. “As a parent on the board, that gives a different perspective, and they wanted a variety of board members.”

With six teachers and 120 students in ninth and 10th grade, the staff and the student body have the time and opportunity to form close bonds.

“It’s a home-type environment,” Hopper said. “The teachers make it a special experience for the students, and students have the opportunity to do well. We had 321 students apply last year and could only take 69. So, the students who come here really want to be here.”

When the school first started it was for grades 10 through 12, with students using half a school year at the academy taking environmental science classes and the other half at their “base” school for core classes.

Today, students take seven classes a day, including core classes.

Since the 2018-19 school year, AES has offered a scuba-diving course to certify students who want to pursue a career in environmental science, from marine biology to underwater welding.

“If this school was no longer here, it would leave a big hole,” Hopper said. “So many people in the community have attended here, or their children have. It’s a one-of-a-kind program, and a rare gem.”

Raising money is nothing new for AES, Michelle Leeper said. What is new is being under a tight, “make or break” deadline.

“We have a requirement that we must have our funding in place in February in order to get the work bid out and get it completed through the summer,” she said. “For a couple of years we’ve been looking online for grants, but we haven’t found anything that’s specifically for maintenance repairs for an existing building.

“If we need computers or books, there are grants for that, and if others are out there, we just haven’t found them,” she said.

The AES board has reached out to parents, alumni, community leaders and the public asking for donations.

“We’ve been trying to get this taken care of,” Leeper said, “we just didn’t expect the elevator being an issue, so that’s additional money we hadn’t planned for, and then costs have changed, and availability (of parts).

“This is not just a school that we love, but that the community loves. Nobody wants to see it closed. The students don’t; the teachers don’t – where else can you go to school and walk out on a dock and see a manatee? Or go kayaking? This place is something special.”