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Nov. 3, 2025                                                                                                Phone: 847-888-5000,ext5300

New Elgin Middle School to be Named 

‘Legacy Middle School’

Nomination submitted by a teacher while waiting for a kidney transplant   

ELGIN  — Katie Pappas explained her medical situation to her young students as “my kidney is broken.” What she couldn’t find a way to tell them was that she didn’t have much longer to live.

Pappas was on month 18 of waiting for a new kidney. She had managed to continue teaching in School District U-46, but her hours outside the classroom were “brutal” — devoted to dialysis treatments that kept her alive but also kept her up all night, suffering from severe joint pain, leg cramps, and digestive problems. Although she tried to stay optimistic, her thoughts drifted toward the legacy she would leave once she was gone. 

“I spent a lot of time thinking, ‘OK, if this is it, did I do enough? Did I do what I was meant to do? Did I do what I came here to do?’” Pappas said. 

To keep her mind on the present, Pappas, a health and physical education teacher in U-46, started brainstorming names for the district’s new middle school that is being constructed in Elgin. Many of the students she teaches at Timber Trails Elementary School in Hoffman Estates will eventually attend the new school. When a call went out for nominations to name the middle school, Pappas thought it would be “something cool” for her to do with her students. 

As names were discussed, Pappas was concerned that naming the school after one person would lose its impact on future generations. Then, Pappas shared with her students her favorite idea — to name it Legacy Middle School to encompass all the individuals who made a significant impact on the school district. The students enthusiastically approved. 

“Legacy” became both Pappas’ personal and professional focus. She championed the name at a public town hall and garnered support, all while continuing to enhance her own legacy by working to make a positive difference in the lives of others. 

And in one serendipitous week, both legacies were extended.

Pappas learned that she was finally getting the gift she desperately needed — a kidney from a living donor. A week after she successfully received the transplant, Pappas watched the U-46 School Board meeting from home as Legacy Middle School was formally recommended as the name for the new building. 

“To have something so positive happen in the midst of utter chaos in my life … it’s a really big deal,” Pappas said. And on Monday, Nov. 3, Pappas joined the U-46 Board of Education meeting virtually to hear its members vote in favor of her suggested name. “It’s something so beautiful, something so cool, something so meaningful. This once-little idea that everybody rallied around, it’s now going to be a place!” 

Legacy Middle School will be the first middle school built in Elgin since 1959 and will play an important role in U-46’s shift to a true middle school model, in which sixth graders, who currently attend elementary school in U-46, will join seventh and eighth graders. 

When it opens for the 2027-28 school year, Legacy is expected to welcome 1,100 sixth, seventh, and eighth graders to a 193,000-square-foot building with state-of-the-art science labs, flexible learning spaces, and collaborative learning stairs.

To build on the name, a “legacy wall” is planned just outside the school’s main office, where local individuals who have contributed to U-46 and its middle schools can be celebrated, and to serve as a reminder that every student and educator continues to build upon the legacy of those who came before.

“Legacy represents everything I love about U-46: growth, perseverance, connection, and leaving the world a little better than we found it,” Pappas said. “This district has given me more than I could ever give back — a career I love, people who inspire me daily, and now, a story that feels like a miracle.”

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School District U-46 serves families in 11 communities: Bartlett, Elgin, Hanover Park, South Elgin, Streamwood and Wayne, as well as portions of Carol Stream, Hoffman Estates, St. Charles, Schaumburg, and West Chicago. In total, the District encompasses 90 square miles within the Fox River Valley, approximately 45 minutes northwest of downtown Chicago, and includes communities within Cook, DuPage and Kane counties. Thirty-three thousand preschoolers through twelfth graders attend the 56 District schools and programs. To learn more, visit the U-46 website, like us on Facebook, and follow us on Instagram and LinkedIn.