Grading

is underway at the 54-acre site of Our Lady of

Mercy, the new Catholic high school in north

Fayette County, set to open in fall 2000.

Sister

Dawn Gear, Grey Nun of the Sacred Heart, has been

named principal of the south side's first

Catholic secondary school, which is on Ga.

Highway 138 at Holyfield Highway.

Gear

will be visiting Catholic parishes in the area

this month and next to present the facts about

Our Lady of Mercy. The first information night

was Sept. 21 at St. John the Evangelist Catholic

School in Hapeville. Sept. 26, she will appear at

Our Lady of Vietnam Catholic Church in Riverdale

at 10 a.m. and Oct. 3 at 7:30 p.m. at Holy

Trinity Catholic Church in Peachtree City.

Ground

was broken March 3 for the college preparatory

school, which will accommodate 450 students in

grades 9-12. For the first year, only the ninth

and tenth grades will be open for enrollment.

Gear

believes that the success of Our Lady of Mercy

will depend on local parents giving her and the

school's handpicked staff a chance to educate the

whole child in an environment that espouses

gospel values and strong academics. "The

success will be there," she said recently

during one of her weekly visits to the

construction site. "They will be getting in

on the ground floor... building a

community," she said.

Developing

a school from its early stages to its

manifestation as a fully staffed facility is

nothing new to Gear. In fact, Our Lady of Mercy

is the third Catholic school she has founded. Not

content to wait until the foundation is laid and

the walls take shape, Gear has her own hard hat

which she wears during consults with the

construction crew. She is attuned to every detail

of the building phase, from the placement of

electric outlets to the color of the cafeteria

tiles.

Gear

took on her new assignment in January, after

serving as the founding principal of The

Archbishop Thomas A. Donnellan School in Atlanta.

She was also the guiding force and first

principal of Saint John Neumann Regional Catholic

School in Atlanta from 1986-1996. Prior to that,

she was a teacher and assistant dean of students

and studies at Saint Pius X Catholic High School

in Atlanta.

Gear

has been an educator for 35 years, with 24 of

those years spent in Atlanta.

Our

Lady of Mercy will follow the blueprint of

Blessed Trinity High School being built in

Roswell by the Catholic Archdiocese of Atlanta.

The campus will include a chapel, cafeteria,

media center and library, learning lab, rooms for

band, choral, drama and dance activities, an

auditorium, and facilities for special ministries

and guidance programs. Gear estimated $1.4

million was tagged for technology, which would

include five computers in each classroom and 11

computers in the science lab.

Athletic

facilities will include a gymnasium, regulation

size fields for football, track, soccer, baseball

and softball plus tennis. Tuition for the

2000-2001 academic year is $6,500. Prospective

students must complete an application, an essay

and take the Secondary School Admission Test.