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LAOTTO – The teachers and staff at LaOtto Elementary School realize their building is nothing special.
In fact, it’s typical – a low, sprawling utilitarian box of beige bricks and windows, its neat lines emblematic of 1960s style.
That doesn’t make it easy to say goodbye.
The East Noble School Corp. will close the 44-year-old school of 125 students after June 1, part of a reconfiguration and consolidation plan meant to save the district at least $925,000.
On Thursday morning, instructional assistant Kay Deveau stepped out of a room filled with animated kindergartners into the quiet corridor she’s been walking for almost 15 years.
"I not only am losing my workplace, but I’m losing a foundation of my community," Deveau said.
The sign at Indiana 205 and Old Indiana 3 makes LaOtto seem like a pass-through town; one arrow points west to Churubusco, another east to Garrett.
But the town is home to about 1,600 residents who have built factories and businesses amid enduring landmarks. The digital sign on the new bank building on the east end of town reads "Goodbye To The School."
The fire department rests in the shadow of the self-described Famous Sit’n Bull Pub and Patio.
For four decades, LaOtto residents have watched busloads of children arrive at the small school near the town’s main intersection. Last year, they rallied support to replace the elementary school’s ancient playground equipment.
No one at LaOtto Elementary School in September – as they installed the hard-earned playground – would have believed that in a year’s time the school would be closed and the equipment moved to a nearby park.
Deveau was shocked.
"It blew me away, I’ll be honest," she said. "You react with bitterness and anger."
Now, she said, the high emotions have given way to a sense of loss in the school’s waning days.
Facing dwindling revenue from the state, the East Noble School Corp. in March voted to close LaOtto Elementary, consolidate the district’s three middle schools into the Kendallville Middle School building and reconfigure six elementary schools.
The reorganization cut more than a dozen jobs. Students will be sent to Avilla Elementary, where all of LaOtto’s teachers and instructional assistants will have jobs, LaOtto Principal Becky Perkins said. Perkins will be reassigned to the corporation office.
LaOtto Elementary doesn’t have much room to spare, though the site has plenty of land. In the gym, which is also a cafeteria and auditorium, Perkins pushed back a curtain; the stage serves as a makeshift computer lab.
The building is structurally sound, and the shape it’s in has nothing to do with the closing, she said.
"It’s been well-built and well-maintained," she said. "But it’s hard to keep a school open these days with 125 kids in it."
Instead of one class each, every grade level in Avilla will have three, Perkins said.
A bigger pool of students will be the most noticeable change from LaOtto, and if anything bothers 11-year-old Kirsten Wolf, it’s that.
"We only have one class, and we have a lot of respect for each other," she said.
But she and classmate Noelle Gaff, 11, said a picnic last week at Avilla Elementary helped ease their minds.
"I knew a lot of people there," Noelle said.
No decisions have been made on what to do with the school building.
Kindergarten teacher Monica LeFever, who has worked at LaOtto Elementary for 23 years, said she’s not sure what she wants to see the building become if it’s not a school.
LeFever said the change has been harder on longtime staff than the children, and it’s the children who will make the school’s closing easier.
"The good memories come with the kids," she said.
"And we’re taking them with us."
