Baldwin Times

Orange Beach City Schools is officially the newest city school system in Alabama! A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held Friday morning at Orange Beach Middle/High School to mark the historic day in Orange Beach - July 1, 2022. 

It was also officially Superintendent Randy Wilkes first day on the job and what a way to start. 

“It is a great day in Orange Beach, Alabama. Can we agree?” Wilkes said, kicking off the ribbon-cutting ceremony with a round of applause and cheers. “It is absolutely fantastic to see everyone today.”

He followed by rattling off the timeline of how the state’s newest school system formed in record time. From the City Council’s unanimous approval on March 15, 2022 to separate from Baldwin Schools to July 1, 2022, the official separation day. 

“I have a degree, two actually, in mathematics,” Wilkes said. “According to my calculation, that is 107 days in which this school system was created. Here’s a little bit of perspective because we’re in Andy Andrews territory, it only took God six days to create the heavens and the earth, just saying, but 107 days to create a school system is remarkable. And what gives me just a little bit of angst is that it's 41 days until we open our doors for students. That’s less than 150 days from start to service. That’s pretty remarkable people. Pretty remarkable. It’s been an amazing journey thus far and there’s no doubt that the best is yet to come.”

Orange Beach City Schools Board of Education President Robert Stuart began by wishing everyone a “Happy Separation Day” and talked about an early conversation that he and Mayor Tony Kennon had. 

“There’s no telling what we were talking about, it was something about the schools, and what the conversation was about was this is a God thing,” Stuart said. “So before I thank anyone else, I want to thank my Lord and Savior. Then after the Lord blessed it, I really appreciate the mayor and council for their vision and courage to make this happen. You know, it hasn’t been the easiest thing but with this leadership, their determination, their drive, there is no way that this will fail. So thank you, thank you very much. Next folks, I want to thank - and yes I had to write it down, I guess it’s an age thing - I want to thank my fellow board members, the teachers, the staff, everyone that stood with us and that are excited about making this not just the best school in the county, the state, but a premier school in this nation. And we are on the way.” 

Stuart added that the mission of the school board is very simple: “We want Orange Beach to be the best and we are going to do everything we can to make that happen.”

Following up on Stuart’s thoughts, Mayor Kennon said what was accomplished in just over 100 days should not have been humanly possible. 

“It was divine intervention, divine providence, divine fill-in-the-blank, it doesn’t matter, it was of the good Lord above and I believe that with all of my heart,” Kennon said. “To see this mayor and council be in place at this time, the right minds, and this board come together with a commonality that I just never in a million years thought five people would have because they know where we’re going - and we’re all going in the same direction - and then for Randy to show up and all of the other hires and the teachers - it is just the Orange Beach version of the parting of the Red Sea.”

With that, Mayor Kennon added, comes a demand for greatness. “Because He expects greatness. The good Lord expects greatness from us and I don’t think we can settle for anything less. The pressure is on and we are starting today. We will be greater than great. We need to say no more. So I thank everyone for being here because this is truly a historic day.”

After the blessing of the school system was led by Pastor Jim Kinder of Orange Beach UMC, Mayor Kennon took time to recognize one individual. 

While there are way too many people to thank and it's hard to just single one person out, Mayor Kennon said “there is one person that I think was instrumental and this is the second time this person has held things together when it was falling apart. And that’s Robbie Smith. Thank you, Robbie. We couldn’t have done it without you.”

In addition to the ceremonial ribbon cutting, the Coastal Alabama Business Chamber proclaimed July 1, 2022 as Orange Beach City Schools Day. 

Congratulations to everyone who made this day possible for Orange Beach students. Go Makos!

Original source can be found here.