Check out new $165M tech school. The 10th grader inside you will wish you went here.

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By Karen Yi | NJ Advance Media

To honor the legacy of a late advocate and Congressman, a parade of politicians filed into the new Donald M. Payne School of Technology in Newark on Monday, remembering the state’s first black Congressman and praising the 320,000 square-foot vocational school built in his honor.

“He was a teacher first. Education meant everything to him and I don’t think that there’s more of a befitting honor than you have given him,” U.S. Rep. Donald Payne Jr., D-10th Dist, said of his late father, Donald Payne Sr. “What is going to be important is what happens inside this building.”

The $165 million three-story school on West Market Street will serve 1,100 students.

“Building this school was a massive undertaking and it took the cooperation from all levels of government to make it a reality,” Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo said. The school is part of the county’s Schools of Technology district.

“This truly demonstrates what can be accomplished when multiple levels of government work together,” he added.

New school dedication
Essex County officials held a ribbon cutting ceremony at the new Donald M. Payne, Sr. School of Technology in Newark , NJ. Monday,06/4/2018 (Ed Murray | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)
Construction on the school began in March 2016 on a property that had been abandoned for decades after United Hospital closed its doors in the mid 1990s.

Painted in bright oranges, greens and purples, the state-of-the-art facility boasts of 58 academic classrooms and more than 30 career technology spaces for culinary arts, cyber security, cosmetology, green energy and others. A large construction commons will house plumbing, electrical, carpentry and HVAC programs, and allow students to practice on model homes or boats.

New school dedicationCulinary arts area. Essex County officials held a ribbon cutting ceremony at the new Donald M. Payne, Sr. School of Technology in Newark , NJ. Monday,06/4/2018 Ed Murray | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

Former Gov. Chris Christie, a major supporter of the project, was also in attendance Monday with his wife, Mary Pat Christie. He told the packed auditorium of students and dignitaries it took him just minutes to decide to support the school.

Under Christie’s administration, the state agreed to fund 90 percent of the $165M project through debt service payments.

New school dedicationBuilding trades area. Essex County officials held a ribbon cutting ceremony at the new Donald M. Payne, Sr. School of Technology in Newark , NJ. Monday,06/4/2018 Ed Murray | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

The Payne school will replace Bloomfield Tech and North 13th Street Tech in Newark. The schools were built in 1930 and 1928, respectively, and will be sold to offset the remaining 10 percent cost of the project.

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