Schools build community.

At least that’s the evidence history gives us. From frontier times until the present, people have gathered at their school buildings to make important decisions about their lives and the well being of the community.

Schools also provide a haven for intellectual exploration in the classroom. Teachers learn and instruct, as do their students.

Here are two very good reasons why communities need school buildings that encourage gathering in public; encourage lifelong learning; provide secure places for learning and for sharing knowledge.

In about 600 days, Selma will have a new high school building.

This movement toward a new building is not without risk, considering the finances of the state that also affect the local school district.

When the bulldozers and workmen arrive they will carry out a dream that began back in the 1970s — a dream deferred until the present.

Our congratulations are offered to the school boards of the past and present; to the administrations that worried through the initial planning stages and brought our community here to the threshold of realization.

It is our hope the new Selma High School will provide a nurturing atmosphere in which children will learn and educators will thrive.

And, it is our wish this new structure becomes the epitome of community, as together we build it.