For 26 years, students at ASTEC Charter Schools in Oklahoma City did their coursework inside a shopping mall, with no gymnasium of their own and no windows in many classrooms. This year, that changed. The school has moved its secondary students into a brand-new 157,000-square-foot building, leaving behind the former Shepherd Mall space that was never built with classrooms in mind.
As reported by News 9, ASTEC Charter Schools held classes in the former Shepherd Mall building for 26 years, a space designed for shopping center use rather than classrooms. During that time, the school dealt with ongoing HVAC problems and inadequate classroom space, and students had to travel to a nearby church just to take gym class, according to the station's report. Founder and CEO Dr. Freda Deskin and her staff spent summers over those 26 years renovating the building themselves to make it work, per the same account.
Oklahoma City's Journal Record documented the scope of the old setup back in 2013: ASTEC occupied 60,000 square feet of the 709,000-square-foot Shepherd Mall, supplementing that space with three portable classrooms outside the main building. The site lacked a gymnasium and auditorium altogether, and students were bused to a church every hour for recreation or soccer practice, the paper reported at the time.
A New Campus Built for Learning
The new secondary school now sits on ASTEC's Deskin Campus, a 157,000-square-foot building with a large central atrium, middle school classrooms on one side and high school classrooms on the other, per the News 9 report. The Journal Record described the building as featuring modern classrooms, a FabLab/Maker Space for STEM projects, collaborative learning spaces, a gym and a performing arts center.
Architecture firm fsb-ae.com, which worked on the project, says the building centers on a large, multi-purpose hub called the Community Forum that serves as a dining area, gathering space and the primary circulation route through the school. Linked to that forum, according to fsb-ae.com, are an administrative suite, a faculty suite, middle and high school classrooms, a media center, food service, a gymnasium and an auditorium. That gymnasium, the firm notes, doubles as a FEMA safe room.
Pride in a Place Students Can Call Their Own
The upgrade has visibly changed how students carry themselves, according to the News 9 report. Danny Porter, instructional coordinator for the STEM department, said he's noticed students' pride and sense of identity shift inside the new building, which the station reports has given scholars — as ASTEC refers to its students — a greater sense of pride and belonging.
Eduardo, an ASTEC sophomore, told News 9 he plans to take care of the new building because it's new and he doesn't want to ruin the work others put into it. ASTEC serves students from prekindergarten through 12th grade, and the school has grown dramatically since its founding, expanding from 100 students to 1,700, per the same report.
From 100 Students to a Statewide Success Story
ASTEC started with just 100 sixth- and seventh-grade students, according to News 9. Dr. Deskin founded the school after investing her own retirement savings to get it off the ground, the station reports, and she told News 9 she had imagined the school's building long before the charter school ever opened its doors. Calling the new facility surreal, Deskin said ASTEC deserved better than an old mall, tiny classrooms and no windows.
“Students need opportunity and are as bright as anyone else,” Deskin said, according to the News 9 report. The station notes that ASTEC graduates have gone on to become physician assistants, doctors, investment bankers and technology company leaders, with some former students becoming professors at Harvard and a university in Japan.
Growth Beyond the Mall
The new secondary building is part of a broader expansion for ASTEC over the past several years. The school added a 22,000-square-foot elementary school in 2020, according to the Journal Record. That elementary school opened with 15 new classrooms serving 425 students, per civicbuilders.org, which also reports that ASTEC received a $9.6 million FIF loan to help pay the remaining costs of the land purchased for the new building.
ASTEC's move away from a shopping mall reflects a pattern seen elsewhere in the country, where charter schools have opened inside struggling malls as landlords look for alternative tenants and communities seek more educational options, according to the New York Times. As a free public charter school open to all, ASTEC's journey from a mall storefront to a purpose-built campus marks a milestone for the educational opportunities it has created for students in underserved communities.
