Building Best Facilities in East Texas at All Saints Episcopal School

All Saints Episcopal School Shows Passion for Sport with State-of-the-Art Surface Upgrades. Tarkett Sports solutions from FieldTurf and Beynon Sports raise the East Texas school's potential for athletic success.

Key takeaways:

• All Saints Episcopal School collaborated with Tarkett Sports to create top athletic facilities that reflect its commitment to student-athlete success.
• Projects included a year-round baseball facility, a resurfaced football/soccer field and track, and a new playground surface for younger students.
• School leaders cited strong communication and delivery from Tarkett Sports, resulting in a smooth construction process with minimal change orders.
• The upgraded facilities have enhanced athletic performance, increased community engagement, and helped elevate the school's athletic programs.
• Designed to be among the best in East Texas, the upgraded facilities provide first-class resources for students, coaches, and the broader community.

All Saints Episcopal School in Tyler, TX, had a vision of providing its student community with the top athletic facilities in East Texas. To achieve that goal, the school turned to Tarkett Sports for two of its leading surfacing solutions: FieldTurf (artificial turf) and Beynon Sports (track system). In addition to new turf and track systems at Mewbourne Field, home to football and soccer, the school also had a playground surface installed for students from pre-K through middle school. Overall, 600 students are benefiting from these facility upgrades.

Check out the video for the full story.

Edited transcript of Mark Desjardins, Head of School at All Saints Episcopal School, and Gretchen Mercer, Athletic Director at All Saints Episcopal School, discussing Tarkett Sports surfacing solutions.

Mark Desjardins (MD): The best part about working with Tarkett Sports is that they deliver, they execute. When you work with a firm, you're hoping to have a partnership and you're hoping to have great communication. And so, I think for the three projects that we did here at All Saints, I think we had less than 10 change orders, which I think is a real testament to the communication that happens on the front end.

Gretchen Mercer (GM): All Saints decided to use FieldTurf and Beynon because of Dr. Desjardins and the wonderful experiences that he had had in the past, and the reputation that the companies have.

MD: Athletics is the front porch for any institution, and if it is your front porch, you want to have the best facilities that you can afford.

GM: The facilities are the best we've ever had, and we have experienced more success this year in athletics in many, many years.

MD: Our goal and our vision was to provide the best facilities in all of East Texas.

GM: The three athletic facilities that Tarkett has installed for us have been transformational to All Saints.

MD: The vision behind the athletic facilities was providing the best possible resources for our athletes and our coaches to be successful. We wanted to send a commitment to the Tyler community that we cared about athletics, we were passionate about athletics, and in doing that, you have to have first-class facilities.

GM: The idea is just to provide the highest quality facilities for our athletic programs, really in line with everything that we do here at All Saints.

MD: Our first product was a playground surface mainly for pre-K through middle school. We turned a grass field into a fully playable year-round baseball facility, and then our final project was a resurfacing of a current football field and a resurfacing of a track.

GM: Our incredible football and soccer field and track is state-of-the-art and the prettiest in the town.

MD: Our mission is really fulfilled when we have a strong sense of community. Friday night lights get about 1,500 people that will come down, so it really extends our capacity to serve not just our community but the greater Tyler community as well.

GM: As an All Saints graduate myself, we've never had facilities like this in athletics and so to think about the elevation of our baseball program, the green space for all of our students every day, and then Mewbourne Field for soccer, football, and track, it's truly unbelievable. Our students and our coaches and our families have never had an experience like this to compete, and there's no doubt that every opposing team that comes to visit, every visitor, they're blown away. We have the nicest facilities in East Texas.