Caesar Rodney School District history

In 1926, the aging frame Star Hill School was replaced by a new two room brick structure and an identical building was constructed in Wyoming.

In 1939 the Dover Special School District opened the Booker T. Washington School, which also included ninth grade and accepted interested Caesar Rodney minority students.

By 1955, a second elementary classroom wing was added that included a separate elementary office and library.

In 1956, a new auto mechanics and home economics wing was added in the rear for the high school students.

The first of those was Dover Air Force Base School, which opened in 1961 and served students in grades one through twelve.

Also in 1963, the district opened the Kent County School for Trainables next to the Allen Frear School in Rising Sun, a school operated by the district but serving severely disabled students from around the county.

McIlvaine would then go on to serve as the Magnolia School principal for the next 45 years, retiring in 1964.

In the fall of 1967 the new Caesar Rodney High School was opened on Old North Road, leaving the original Caesar Rodney School building to serve as Caesar Rodney Junior High.

Finally, in 1969 the state legislature, in an effort to eliminate the last of the one room school districts in the state, consolidated all remaining districts into twenty-three reorganized school districts.

In 1970, the school was named in honor of J. Ralph McIlvaine, who had served as teacher and principal at the Magnolia School for 47 years.

The final decade of the 20th century saw a reversal in the downward enrollment trend of the previous 20 years, with the district reporting a total enrollment of 6,737 students during the 2000 school year. As a result, the district constructed a new Nellie Hughes Stokes Elementary School south of Camden, which was ready for the opening of school in 1997.

The Caesar Rodney Junior High School building, including all of the additions to the original Caesar Rodney School and the first Nellie Hughes Stokes Elementary School wings, were leveled during the summer of 1999 to make way for new athletic fields for Fifer Middle School.

The Star Hill renovation was completed in 2003 with the students and staff able to return home to a state-of-the-art facility.

The massive $32 million high school project would continue until September 2005, with the expansion and renovation completed in five separate phases.

In 2006, the Charlton School renovation and expansion was completed, with that facility now bridging across to Allen Frear Elementary and sharing common spaces such as the cafeteria and library.