The former Crim High School building in Atlanta has a new name.
The Atlanta Board of Education this week unanimously approved changing the name of Alonzo A. Crim High School to East Atlanta Campus.
The board voted in 2019 to close the high school, which in recent years served as one of the district’s alternative high schools. Crim graduated its final class in 2020.
The closure was part of an effort to consolidate alternative programs that assist students who haven’t succeeded in a traditional high school or who want a different kind of setting.
The old high school building, located off Memorial Drive, bore the name of Alonzo Crim, Atlanta’s first Black superintendent.
When the board voted to close the school, they also renamed the district’s downtown headquarters to honor Crim. The central office is called the Alonzo A. Crim Center for Learning and Leadership.
A district policy says that, to avoid confusion and duplication, APS should not have two buildings named after the same person.
Board member Michelle Olympiadis led the committee that recommended the new East Atlanta Campus name. She said the group wanted a flexible name that would accommodate various current and future uses of the site “until we have a better understanding of how we are going to be using the facility moving forward.”
The building currently houses Phoenix Academy, founded a few years ago during the district’s consolidation moves to serve non-traditional APS students.
The site also is home to a handful of district programs and services, including the nutrition department, a day care for children of students at Phoenix Academy and a special education program, Olympiadis said.
