Waco envisions possibilities for Bledsoe-Miller STEAM center

Earlier this year programming from the facility was transferred over to the newly renovated Doris Miller Community Center, leaving the Bledsoe-Miller center vacant.

The idea for Bledsoe-Miller is to provide science, technology, engineering, math and arts programming for people of all ages. Several companies and organizations have expressed interest in partnering with the center, including SpaceX, L3Harris, Microsoft, Mars Wrigley, Cisco and several local educational institutions.

Waco Strategic Initiatives Director Tom Balk opened the night’s meeting, acknowledging Deputy City Manager Deidra Emerson, the “city manager’s office champion” of the project; Council Member Andrea Barefield, who dreamed up the idea and holds the facility in her district; and the city’s chosen design firm, Perkins and Will’s Austin branch.

“It’s had such a strong legacy in our community,” Balk said. “It’s going to continue to do so, and that’s one of the exciting things about this conversation tonight to kick off the redevelopment visioning process for what will become the Bledsoe-Miller STEM and Cultural Arts Center, or STEAM, in its next chapter.”

Barefield, who came up with the STEAM idea after visiting Dallas’ Best Buy Teen Tech Center, said Bledsoe-Miller has always been a part of her life and she has seen it serve as a staple for the community, “a place that personalities were born and made.”

The building and adjacent Bledsoe-Miller Park have a rich legacy in Waco, serving generations of families with park space, swimming and basketball, she said. The area around 1912 was first called Mackey Park, named after Mayor J.H. Mackey, before transitioning to Bledsoe-Miller Park in the 1950s.

“And then this building was done in ’72,” Barefield said. “You know, we understand what type of treasure this was and the namesakes of this building … renowned Broadway singer Jules Bledsoe, and what a great opportunity to host this meeting today when we honor Doris Miller and Pearl Harbor Day as a Waco hero.”

Barefield said the project to advance the facility should keep the building’s original mission, honoring the accomplishments of its namesakes and recognizing the journeys they took to overcome racial barriers of the time. She said it should also honor other Wacoans who paved the way for African Americans in STEM, including James Andrew Harris, the first African American to discover chemical elements, both rutherfordium and dubnium; and Dr. Vivienne Malone-Mayes, who was the fifth African American woman in the country to earn a doctoral degree.

“So you think you have these amazing scientific minds right here, and that’s just two,” Barefield said. “There are many others. What happens if we foster that now? If we make a place for those seeds to be able to take root and grow? … We owe it to the next generation of Wacoans to create and maintain that sense of place, to provide adequate resources and access to opportunities and know that those will advance them in a way that will lead them to greatness just like those who came before them.”

She said Thursday’s open house kicked off the process of discovering what “K-through-gray edutainment” could look like, gathering feedback on programming for a community space for people of all ages.

“This place can still continue to be a space where young folks find themselves. It can be a place where our older community is engaged,” Barefield said. “I mean, it’s just not going to be one of those where physical things happen in a recreational sense, but I think that today begins a new chapter for this building, and the only way we can do it is to hear back from you all.”

Angela Whitaker-Williams, Perkins and Will principal for K-12 education, asked the group an insightful question before beginning the night’s visioning assignment: “In 10 or 15 years, what do you want to look back and say this new place gave to me or my family?”

Annakaren Bejarano, who moved to Waco from California, said she would like to see her young son, Sebastian, taking part in the center’s activities.

“He’s going to grow up here,” Bejarano said. “He’s going to be part of this community. I hope when he grows he stays here.”

Resident Rocky Miller said he hopes the redesign keeps the history and culture of what already exists at the site.

“It would give many young people opportunities that they probably wouldn’t dream of before this was transformed,” Miller said. “… I was able to swim in the pool here and play basketball in the gym, not only as a child but as a young man and older man playing basketball here. My kids and even my grandkids came here and their lives were enriched because of the experiences they had in this building.”

He said he hopes the redesign keeps the tradition, but offers even more opportunities for growth, such as an opportunity for his daughter who is an engineering student to come back and make a contribution to her community through STEM interaction.

Other attendees expressed the need for children to imagine new possibilities and have opportunities for educational growth outside the classroom that will propel them in future careers.

Wyatt Frantom, Perkins and Will design director, said the facility has “great bones,” requiring very little structural rework and offering room for modernization. He said the group will attempt to amplify the building while maintaining its traditional aspects and character.

“There’s some nostalgia to it that we weren’t really expecting to hear about tonight, but I think that’s great that there’s an emotional tie to what’s here,” Frantom said. “And of course the locale and the placement on the river is part of that and its anchoring of the memorial park.”

Frantom said the process will involve designers being the receivers of information from the community, taking what they learn from visioning into the next steps of the design process.

“There’s an underlying sentiment about what this should be, not just physically or even emotionally, but functionally in the community, that in many ways it will serve as a foothold for constituents, it will serve as a platform to elevate the community and further to serve as a catapult for the next generation of youth coming from Waco and the more immediate community.”

Residents showed their preferences by placing stickers next to programming options spread across the room. They expressed high interest in SAT/ACT prep, financial literacy courses, computer programming, after-school programs, video and audio recording and culinary experiences.