New Visalia elementary school opens in time for new school year

VISALIA, Calif. (KFSN) -- A new elementary school in Visalia opened its doors getting ready to welcome students for their first day of school.

Parents, principals and students came together at the new Denton Elementary School campus on Monday for the official ribbon cutting.

Stephanie Gendron will be the new principal for the school and spoke to new parents as they toured the classrooms.

"We are excited to serve our neighborhood students. We will have 450 students; we will also be a campus that serves students with more special education needs," Gendron said.

Gendron says along with a new building future Denton Dragons will have state of the art technology, extended learning spaces, and flexible furniture options to enhance learning.

"It's not only exciting but its fun for our students to have access to technology and innovation," she said.

Visalia Unified officials also say the school will provide some much-needed relief to an ongoing problem across campuses.

"It was built to alleviate crowding at Hurley, as well as Gosha, and Oak Grove elementary. Those were operating over 100 percent capacity. We had to bring in portables," said district facilities director Gerry Lemus.

School officials say while the school has more than 400 students enrolled, they'll have the capacity for 700 kids as they continue to grow.

Denton Elementary is the twenty-sixth elementary school campus for Visalia Unified. The first day of classes is next week.