When the school year begins next week, Danbury's third middle school will reopen.  School officials held a ribbon cutting and open house Wednesday at the West Side Middle School Academy.  Superintendent of Schools Dr Sal Pascarella says 300 6th, 7th and 8th graders in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Math program will be located at the former Mill Ridge Intermediate School. 

There will also be a Global Studies Academy open to 6th graders.  Glass says there will also be 100 6th graders in the Global Studies Academy.  Over the next two years, that academy will be populated.

There was an application process for each Academy.  The STEM program is moving from Rogers Park Middle School.  Mill Ridge was closed in 2010, and was retrofitted with these academies to relieve overcrowding in the schools and to provide more specialized choices for students.