Photo courtesy of Loy Woelber Space in the former Lincoln Elementary school library in Ivanhoe has been renovated to provide a place for a new local child care provider to open. Ivanhoe Superintendent Loy Woelber said making the space available for a provider to rent would both provide a needed service in the community, and help keep the school building viable.

IVANHOE — It’s important for the community of Ivanhoe to keep its local school viable, said Loy Woelber, Ivanhoe Superintendent Loy Woelber. Woelber said the school district and the Ivanhoe Economic Development Authority have been working toward that goal by making part of the school building available to a new local child care provider.

Part of Lincoln Elementary School’s former library has been converted into space that the provider will rent, Woelber said this week. He said provider Amanda Kulla plans to open her day care next week.

“We think she’ll be a good fit,” said Shad Lipinski, of the Ivanhoe EDA.

Lipinski said the EDA is still advertising for more child care providers, to help meet community needs.

Woelber said he hoped that having a child care provider move into space in the school would be a way to encourage enrollment at Lincoln Elementary, and make good use of the building.

“My overall goal is, one, to get more kids” enrolled at Lincoln Elementary in the future, he said. “The second half is, it’s such a big building, we’ve got to make use of the space.”

Earlier this year, Woelber said the Ivanhoe School District had started early conversations with the Minneota School District about the possibility of consolidation, due to enrollment declines at Lincoln Elementary. The school averages around 10 students in a grade, in pre-K through sixth grade. Lincoln Elementary students mainly go to Minneota for secondary school, Woelber said.

At this point, discussions with Minneota about consolidation haven’t continued, Woelber said. In the meantime, he said he was also focused on finding additional purpose and community use for the school facilities. Ivanhoe still as about nine years left on a building bond that completely remodeled the school.

Lincoln Elementary has great staff and continues to get good test scores, Woelber said.

“We need more kids,” he said.

Ivanhoe has recently seen an increase of young families moving to town, Lipinski said. It’s positive for the community, but new families have also faced challenges finding housing and child care, he said.

“We had one (child care) provider closing at the end of July,” Lipinski said.

EDA members wanted to have another provider up and running in town before then.

Lipinski said the EDA created a $3,000 startup grant for a child care provider, and earlier this year they partnered with the Ivanhoe School District to advertise space for a family-based child care provider in the school building.

“It was kind of a win-win,” Lipinski said. “We thought we could help the school out by having it in there.”

“There’s a good group of people with that EDA, who want their community to survive,” Woelber said. “They’re trying to think outside of the box.”

Woelber said the EDA helped make some minor renovations to Lincoln Elementary’s library space, to give the day care access to a bathroom. The school library was moved into a different room in the building, he said.

Woelber said he hoped partnering with the Ivanhoe EDA and local child care providers would be one way to attract future students to Lincoln Elementary. The school is also looking at making more parts of the building available for community organizations or businesses. Currently, they’re renting shop space to the Ivanhoe Ambulance service, he said.

Lipinski said the EDA is also trying to address housing needs in Ivanhoe, with an addition on the west side of the city.