Tahquamenon Area Schools says the former Newberry High School school building is likely to be demolished because mold has spread so badly that people should not go inside. The building has been closed for more than a year, and the district is now weighing whether any part of it can still be saved.
Shawn Tebo on Newberry High School
At the special meeting on Monday, October 26, Shawn Tebo said the building had been expected to be mothballed. “My understanding when I came on the board … was it [old high school] was going to be ‘mothballed’ and then it was going to be up to the next administration to figure that out,” he said.
Tebo said the mold is so severe that people should not enter the building. He also said records kept in the basement may still be salvageable, leaving the district with one narrow task even if the structure itself is lost.
Board views on demolition
Jeff Puckett said he supports tearing the building down. “The money that would take to repurpose that, no one’s going to pay that,” he said. “You’ll never get the money back.”
Colleen Duflo said she had understood the old high school was going to be mothballed. Amanda Kitzman said during the board's discussion the week prior, “I said it once, I’ll say it again, I believe that Kenn would make an awesome AD, but chemistry is not something that I think should go online,” after the board had tabled the hiring discussion over concerns about his chemistry class.
Kenn Depew joins TAS
The board voted to hire Kenn Depew as the new district Athletic Director after Dan Hardenbrook resigned. Depew is a Newberry High School alumnus and had previously served as Newberry's Athletic Director for several years before moving into teaching at TAS.
He now teaches leadership, middle school science, and chemistry at TAS. Chemistry was assigned to him on short notice for the 2026-2027 school year, and he is pursuing emergency certification through Teachers of Tomorrow while also drawing on a background in nuclear engineering with the U.S. Navy.
The board also agreed that Depew is well qualified to teach chemistry and hold the position of AD, even though he is not a certified high school chemistry teacher. The district will now look at testing the basement records for mold and wait for information about 23E grants by November 1 as it weighs whether demolition is the only workable path.
