KCK middle school talks about next steps after building fire

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — A Saturday night fire in Wyandotte County left a public school with damage.

Classes can't be held at Arrowhead Middle School on N. 82nd Street for at least a few weeks. Educators have come up with a plan to keep classes going.

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It wasn't a big fire that broke out inside the school's ceiling, but it was enough to leave soot and smoke damage. A spokesperson for this school district tells FOX4 the cause of the fire was likely electrical. The damage is hard to see from outside the building. Classes can't be held until cleanup is complete. A crew got to work on that on Monday afternoon.

"Anytime you have a fire, you have to mitigate that," Edwin Birch, a spokesperson for KCK Public Schools, said on Monday afternoon.

Birch said the building was empty on Saturday night, and nobody was hurt. He said parents were notified this weekend of plans to move Arrowhead Middle School classes to HomeField, the indoor sports facility that's about 10 minutes away at 92nd and State Avenue. Birch said buses will give students a ride if they need one.

"Safety and health of our students and staff is our top priority, so we want to make sure they're in a good, clean learning environment and continuing having classes this week," Birch said.

"We have a few different rooms we're able to put students in, and then, it's going to be kind of an open floor plan with more of a huddle mentality with tables and chairs and soft seating for the learning environment," Kelce Ahern, HomeField's director of operations, said.

There won't be any classes for students there on Friday due to a previously-planned teacher-in-service day for this school district.

Next week is KCK's fall break, leading up to Thanksgiving. Birch said district leaders are hoping to be back inside this middle school building sometime in the next couple of weeks, and they'll re-evaluate matters next week.