Board reviews schematic for Wake Early College of Information and Biotechnologies and Parkside Middle School on constrained Morrisville site

Wake County Schools staff and the design team presented the schematic design for the Wake Early College of Information and Biotechnologies (WKIB) and Parkside Middle School, which will be built together on a constrained 36-acre site off Paramount Parkway in Morrisville.

The project will place the two schools within one building on a site limited by steep topography, multiple stream buffers and an airport overlay. Elizabeth Wakeford and Alice Reese, leading the presentation, said WKIB is planned to serve roughly 200 ninth- and tenth-grade students who will continue to Wake Tech RTP for grades 11–12, while Parkside Middle will serve about 936 students. Because of site constraints the design stacks three-story middle school wings stepping down the slope and keeps the two schools’ main entrances at opposite ends to maintain separation that district leaders requested.

Alice Reese described major constraints: roughly 40 feet of grade change across a narrow buildable width, multiple stream buffers that remove…