Open Door Christian Schools launches expansion

ELYRIA — With its 50th anniversary on the horizon in 2026, Open Door Christian Schools is set to launch a four- phase master plan to grow, upgrade and modernize its school campus over the next decade. Open Door President Denver Daniels said that the overarching "ODCS 2.0, More for His Glory" master plan has been in the works for several years, as the growth of Open Doors' student population and aging of some infrastructure drove school administrators to discuss the future. "We have been blessed with growth for much longer than even three years," he said. We have been thinking about distinct spaces for our middle school and high school programming. We have a great faculty, we have great students. We are now at a place where we want the spaces to be reflective of the quality of students and the quality of instruction that's taking place." The K-12 student population of Open Door is more than 820 students in 2025, with half of them coming from the city of Elyria and most of the rest coming from other communities in Lorain County. In a City Council meeting last month, Daniels said that a small proportion of the school's students come from Cuyahoga and Huron counties. Daniels said that enacting all four phases of the plan would take between 10 and 12 years. Phase one of the plan is a $12 million project to build a new gymnasium for the schools along with other additions and upgrades. The project will be funded through a donation campaign which will formally launch to the public on Sunday, but which has already raised $7 million toward its goal. "This primarily is to enhance our students' experience," Daniels said. "So what this (project) is not is an effort to grab more students, for lack of a better way of saying it. We would love for more students to be introduced to our school campus and what it can be. But what we really wanted to do was enhance our students' everyday experience." The linchpin of the first phase is a new gymnasium, equipped with 800 seats and four locker rooms, and a hallway connecting the gym to the main school campus. It will take up about $10 million of the phases planned $12 million price tag "We have a gymnasium that we just feel underrepresents the quality of our athletic teams," Daniels said. "With our growth, new size constraints are limiting us as far as the academic offerings that we can have during the course of our day. The gymnasium is going to allow us to offer more phys. ed. classes both at the high school and the elementary level." In addition to the benefits the gymnasium itself can bring, Daniels said that the space cleared up by the addition would be a jumpstart to expand learning spaces, further separate the experience of different grade levels and increase flexibility on campus. "The goal of this phase is to really enhance the campus blueprint so that we can provide more academic offerings on site during the day," Daniels said. "The new gymnasium serves as kind of the catalyst to that piece of the project." The rest of phase one will include a new multifunctional commons area, a rear courtyard, a separate gym entrance, a new elementary playground, a new main entrance and upgrades to the kindergarten playground and some of the roads and infrastructure on campus. The main entrance is actually already complete, Daniels said, thanks to work that the school leadership did over the summer to fundraise before the public campaign opened. Located on the south face of the school building, facing the athletic fields, Daniels said that the new entrance not only provided a new look to the school's entryway, but also enhanced student safety by creating a larger dedicated front office to control who came into or out of the school. Daniels said that the plan would also improve student safety and access by moving the elementary school playground closer to the elementary school building. The kindergarten playground will also be renovated. As far as new learning spaces, Daniels said that the common area would serve as a space for small group meetings and additional lunch space when needed, in addition to hosting the concession stand for games. A new group study room has already been added into the space which once hosted the old front office. Another benefit of the new front office, Daniels said, was additional office spaces for teachers who may be displaced from their classroom during a period. Previously, such teachers were left without a dedicated space for them to continue working or planning in between teaching periods. One of the most important pieces of the entire project is the goal of more clearly delineating the experiences of students at the high school, middle school and elementary school levels, Daniels said. Work on that part of the project began before shovels ever went into the ground. "Coming into this school year, we added course offerings and we revised bell schedules for distinct middle school, high school and elementary times." Daniels said. "So what we have now is, that forced us to consider academic spaces differently. I would say that our academic enhancements began even before this phase one element. We now have a completely distinct high school and middle school staff, where before we had some crossover." Daniels said he believes the increased separation will improve the school day experience of all students, and also allow Open Door to run more smoothly and offer more to its students. The fundraising drive will be announced to parents today, and to the congregants of The Church of the Open Door during services on Sunday morning. Future phases of ODCS 2.0 will include the addition of a new high school wing with eight classrooms, an outdoor learning area and small group spaces in phase 2, a new stadium and weight room in phase three and even more high school classrooms and a large multi-purpose learning facility in phase four. "We are committed to our community and we simply love that we have been able to serve this community for nearly 50 years," Daniels said. "We feel like the reason that we are pursuing this is that ODCS 2.0 positions us to continue to serve this region's Christian families in a significant way. We are excited to see what this can do not only for our students, but for the greater community at large." Additional project details are on the project website moreforhisglory.org. Earlier this month, the Elyria City Council voted to reduce the fees Open Door Schools would have to pay for its plan review and permit fees for phase one of the project, something the city also did when Elyria Catholic High School expanded several years ago. Mayor Kevin Brubaker said that he was excited for the growth of the school, and that the city had worked with the school on updating its sewer line connections. Open Door was already planning to add new utility lines to accommodate its planned growth, and Brubaker worked with the school to increase the size of the sewer lines which were run out to the school on Telegraph Road. Brubaker said that these larger lines would allow for additional tap-ins for any future development in the area near the school. Councilwoman Donna Mitchell, D-6th Ward, represents the area including Open Door, and she said she was hopeful about what the addition would mean for the school and the city. "I'm very excited, I am looking forward to seeing their expansion and growth," Mitchell said. "I think this is going to be a catalyst for more growth in the ward. There are some things coming in that area and this is going to be a huge part of that." Contact Owen MacMillan at (440) 329-7123 or omacmillan@chroniclet.com.