Macon East dedicates new indoor practice facility

Coach Glynn Lott cuts the ribbon to the new new indoor practice facility at Macon East Academy. (Tim Gayle)

By TIM GAYLE
CECIL -- City, county and state officials joined with Macon East Academy administrators and trustees as the private school held a ribbon cutting to dedicate its new indoor practice facility on Thursday.

Pike Road mayor Gordon Stone, Montgomery County commissioner Doug Singleton and state House representative Reed Ingram, along with representatives of the Montgomery Area Chamber of Commerce were among those on hand to help headmaster Glynn Lott dedicate the facility, which the school completed just before the end of the 2022-23 school year.

“We’ve been wanting to have an indoor hitting facility,” Lott said. “You go everywhere else and they have something enclosed to hit in. We didn’t and people were saying we’ve had success in baseball and softball, why couldn’t we get one. So we started talking about building an indoor facility -- which was nothing compared to this -- and at the same time with Pike Road growing, we were talking about if we had an influx of students, how long would it take to get a building ready.”

The answer was a building constructed at a cost of approximately $800,000 that could serve as an indoor practice facility for sports in case of inclement weather or as a hitting facility for softball and baseball that could easily be converted to classrooms should a growing enrollment demand it.

“Everything in here is movable,” he said. “It was designed for that. At the same time, if you’ve been to one of our games and had to go to the restroom, our restrooms are probably the smallest in the country and are at the back of our concession stand.”

The new facility, adjacent to the concession stand and located just behind the left field wall of the baseball stadium, includes adequate restroom facilities for football games, allowing school administrators to take that area at the back of the concession stand and convert it to storage. The facility has an artificial turf floor that can come up easily to allow the facility to be converted to four classrooms on either side of the entrance, if necessary.  

The school opened nearly 30 years ago, but hasn’t added to the initial facility in years. As Lott pointed out, the idea of dedicating a new facility appealed to school administrators for other reasons that aren’t as obvious as needing an indoor athletic facility.

“We felt like if we built something, that would show that we’re growing,” he said. “And we are.” 

In addition to serving as an air-conditioned hitting facility for the Knights’ championship baseball and softball programs, the facility can set up quickly for academic events.

“We do testing in here,” Lott said. “We’ve done our ACT testing, PSAT testing, we’ve had science fairs (and) the state science fair will be here this year. Being in the middle of the state, we do host a lot of district, and even state, events for the Alabama Independent School Association.”