Metro Elementary School opens time capsule as first kindergartners finish high school

Since shortly after Metro Elementary School of Design opened in 2011, a large metal sculpture with the school's motto has graced the entrance inside the building. Within it, a time capsule has been waiting for over a decade.

Wednesday evening, the school's first kindergarteners, now seniors soon to graduate from Miller High School, gathered to see the capsule's forgotten contents revealed.

Principal Justin Milner said he plans to add the Miller High School Class of 2024 graduation program and items from the current pre-K class into the capsule and return it to its home in the statue.

Fourteen years from now, the capsule can be re-opened again when today's pre-K students are ready to graduate high school.

Metro Elementary School of Design opened in 2011 as the result of a grant, serving kindergarten through sixth-grade students.

Yulianna Quiroz is one of the school's 17 original kindergarten students, who all came to the capsule-opening decked out in their graduation gowns.

"It hasn't hit me yet," Quiroz said.

She recalls participating in dance and theater at the school, including playing Dorothy in a production of "The Wizard of Oz."

Since the beginning, Metro E has been a fine arts-focused campus, offering a variety of music, art, theater and dance programs. Students took two fine arts classes every day. Academic learning was projects-based.

Marila Colunga was one of the school's original staff members, teaching third grade. Today, she teaches piano and ukulele.

"I had all these babies in third grade," Colunga said Wednesday evening after the time capsule was opened, looking at the former kindergartners now on the cusp of adulthood.

Inside the capsule were t-shirts, a Lego from the school's lost and found, a trophy, "trust card" hall passes, newspaper clippings and papers and flyers once used on the campus. For the students, many of these items brought out only vague memories.

But the teachers remembered. A small rubber figure found inside the capsule was one of many given to teachers by the school's principal to spread confidence and positivity at the new campus, Colunga said.

Inside the capsule was also a large scroll containing the outline of a history project that Colunga and colleague Susan Dalrymple-Hyde had students complete that year when they had another teacher dress as Paul Revere and ride down the hall on a stick horse, reading out the scroll.

Students had to research a historical figure, put together a biography and create a bust of their figure to create a classroom museum.

This assignment, which combined history and art, is an example of what project-based learning looked like in the early days of Metro Elementary, Colunga said.

"We did so many projects like that," Colunga said. "(The math and science teachers) turned our project room into a space station one time."

Metro Elementary is a lottery campus. Families must apply for a spot.

"I think (the school) is probably the best kept secret in all of Corpus Christi," Parent Beth Padgett said. "...For my kids, I liked the well-roundedness of it. I liked that it would be double fine arts, project-based learning. I thought it taught more life skills than sitting in a classroom."

Padgett had two children start at the school in its first year, a kindergartner and a first grader.

"In a blink of an eye, it's happened so fast," Padgett said.

Padgett first heard about the school from her hairdresser.

"As soon as I heard about it, it clicked for me," Padgett said.

Now, she has one child who has already graduated and another graduating this year.

"They were always guided towards being really creative and collaborative and I think this made them very awesome, well-rounded human beings," Padgett said.

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This article originally appeared on Corpus Christi Caller Times: Metro Elementary School students, teachers return to open time capsule