Two hundred forty-five Gompers Junior High School students had a chance to sign one of two 13-foot, 200-pound beams on Friday, February 7, 2025. The beams will be installed in the new Gompers Junior High School that is being built on the southwest corner of Briggs Street and Copperfield Avenue next to the current Gompers Junior High School.
“I am so pleased to see the construction progress of the new Gompers (and Hufford) Junior High Schools,” said Joliet Public Schools District 86 Superintendent Dr. Theresa Rouse, “The sixth-grade students now can say they left a mark on the new school.”
“It is exciting to have the students come out and sign a piece of Gompers history,” added Gompers Junior High School Principal Raul Gaston.
The current sixth grade class of Gompers will be the first class of students to graduate in the new school in 2027. The new Gompers will house approximately 700 sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students when the new school is open in August of 2026.
Hufford Junior High School sixth grade students also had a chance to sign a beam in December 2025 that is included in the office area of the new school.