The second flagship location of the Boys and Girls Clubs of Carroll County officially opened Tuesday, marking the return of children to the halls of the former North Carroll High School building in Hampstead. When students in the facility’s inaugural class cut the ceremonial ribbon, some were filled with such excitement and fervor that they cut the ribbon multiple times.
The ceremony was well attended by county commissioners, school board members, and leaders of organizations that partner with the Boys and Girls Clubs. County Commissioners President Ken Kiler, whose district includes Manchester, Hampstead and Finksburg on the board, delivered remarks.
“The Hampstead-Manchester communities desperately need the structure that [the Boys and Girls Clubs of Carroll County] furnished,” Kiler said. “It’s even more important today to keep kids active and engaged. The Boys and Girls Clubs have had a presence in our community prior to this, but the North Carroll clubhouse is a giant positive step forward.”
Opening exactly six years after the first flagship location in Westminster, the 16,000-square-foot Hampstead clubhouse has completed the first phase of renovations. The project cost about $400,000 in total, and was funded from various sources, including about $100,000 of in-kind donations, Boys and Girls Clubs of Carroll County CEO Sean Davis said.
The next phase will be funded with $1.4 million in federal money earmarked for the project, thanks in part to a concerted effort from U.S. Sens. Ben Cardin and Chris Van Hollen, both Democrats representing Maryland, and Democratic U.S. Reps. John Sarbanes, of District 3, and Dutch Ruppersberger, from District 2.
“That [next phase] will really help us make it a high-tech, safe and innovative club for kids for years to come,” Davis said.
The project’s second phase will include HVAC work, redesigned bathrooms, and more square feet of renovated space to support additional programs, Davis said.
“There’s a lot of work that still needs to be done,” Davis said, “but right now it’s safe for kids, and they’re enjoying phase one of the project.”
The facility features ample space across multiple rooms, with comfortable seating, computers, and other devices for students’ enrichment and fun. The facility includes a greenhouse and a Cal Ripken Sr. Foundation STEM center, among other amenities.
An eighth grader at North Carroll Middle School, Rae Harris-Schwind, 13, of Manchester, said she is thrilled with the new facility and the opportunities it presents.
“We’ve been waiting for this for a while,” Harris-Schwind said. “Just being here and having the upgrade — it’s something that we never thought we would have. We’re so grateful, and it’s just amazing.”
Harris-Schwind said she recommends joining the club to all kids.
The new facility was soft launched several weeks ago for students attending Shiloh and North Carroll middle schools and Manchester Valley High School, Davis said. When elementary schools are included, the site should be at least as big as the Westminster location.
North Carroll High closed its doors in 2016 amid a systemwide decline in enrollment. The site was purchased by Blue Ocean, a real estate investment firm headquartered in Reisterstown, and is being redeveloped as the Coppermine Pantherplex, a 60-acre space with baseball and softball fields, athletic fields and a stadium, indoor and outdoor courts, and about 300,000 square feet of multipurpose commercial and educational spaces.
Davis said the Boys and Girls Clubs kids will benefit greatly from access to the sports complex’s gyms and 850-seat theater.
“We’re ecstatic for the kids,” Davis said, “because there’s gonna be a Boys and Girls Club on a multi-acre sports complex, so they get to take advantage of a lot of those opportunities.”
Harris-Schwind said she is most looking forward to using the facility’s fields for sports and games.
Davis said Coppermine Pantherplex is likely to add features, including turf fields, pickle ball, and sand volleyball courts.
The new space also presents an opportunity for the Boys and Girls Clubs of Carroll County to launch a new leadership academy, which will expand upon the existing teen leadership summer program. The program is designed to provide teams with mentorship, career exploration, leadership and workforce development opportunities, Davis said, and is identified as highly impactful and beneficial. Enrollment in the program is expected to triple once the leadership academy is open.
The Kahlert Foundation has committed to investing $750,000 over five years, to help grow the summer leadership academy and expand the program’s capacity to serve kids during the school year. The foundation is a nonprofit established in 1991 by William “Bill” E. Kahlert. Kahlert died in 2011 and was the co-founder of Evapco Inc., a worldwide manufacturer of evaporative cooling products, with corporate offices in Taneytown.
“The current leadership academy is going to serve over a thousand kids in the next five years,” Davis said. “It’s giving them workforce readiness opportunities, leadership development, and team-building, in different experiences that they probably wouldn’t have the opportunity to delve into, they’ll be able to do that now.”
Youth enrolled in the yearlong Leadership Academy last summer visited Carroll Community College to exploring career opportunities in drones, phlebotomy, welding, and being a nursing or dental assistant. The yearlong Leadership Academy is funded by a $25,000 grant from The Kahlert Foundation.
The workforce academy is a Boys and Girls Club leadership program geared toward high school students, which aims to helps the Boys and Girls Club realize its goal of transforming children into career-ready adults by exposing them to multiple fields that may develop into a passion, said club spokesperson Erin Bishop.
Partnerships with community organizations are vital to the club’s success, Davis said, and early partnerships with Carroll County Public Schools and McDaniel College were particularly instrumental in growing the club to its current size.
Each year, around 25 McDaniel students complete a work study program at the club in preparation for careers in social work, education, or a similar field. Davis said those students are on the front lines of working with the kids, where they have great success in relating to the children and providing mentorship.
The public school system provides transportation to the Boys and Girls Clubs’ first flagship location in Westminster, and are currently transporting kids from North Carroll Middle, Shiloh Middle and Manchester Valley High to the new clubhouse.
“Carroll County Public Schools years ago started transporting kids,” Davis said. “They saw what we were doing and the benefits it was having on a smaller level, and they started transporting kids from the schools to our facility. That has helped us grow leaps and bounds.”
The organization also operates community impact sites at North Carroll, Northwest, Sykesville and Mount Airy middle schools. Those schools host programs in-house, Davis said, while the new site’s status as a flagship location means students will have access to all of the additional resources the facility can provide, as well as a welcome after-school change of energy for students.
“It’s come a long way,” Harris-Schwind said. “We used to be in a library at our school, and just being here in this huge high school has been really different. I mean, there’s, like, rooms for everything. There’s the greenhouse room for the science, there’s the fields for sports. There’s everything like you could think of — it’s here.”
Opening a location in the North Carroll area was originally part of the club’s multiyear plan, but Davis said the opportunity to lease space that presented itself last fall was too great to pass up. Davis said the new facility represents a smart growth opportunity for the organization.
Davis said preliminary conversations about a third flagship location serving Taneytown have occurred, but there is no official timeline for when such a project would begin.
“I think there’s a need up there,” Davis said, “and they can really benefit from from having a community center or a Boys and Girls Club location.”
The Boys and Girls Clubs of Carroll County recently changed its name from the Boys and Girls Club of Westminster. The club is supported by grants and donations. Membership costs each child $30 annually, but the Westminster chapter spends about $4,000 on each member during the year. The club functions as an extension of the school day for about 175 students daily, according to Erin Bishop, the club’s marketing director.
