The family whose name is on the new school central office — the Wallace Educational Forum — has donated money to complete a dome on the structure.

The Rowan-Salisbury Board of Education announced the $320,196 gift in a statement of gratitude from Chairman Josh Wagner Friday morning — right on the deadline the school board set to raise funds for the feature.

“This is exciting because it ensures that school system funds will not be spent for the dome or its related costs,” Wagner said. “This was the intent of the Board of Education since the dome was considered as an alternate.”

Wagner said the Wallace family — Lee and Mona Wallace and daughters Whitney Williams and Lane Wallace —  is committed to seeing this project completed quickly and effectively, and that they want to reduce costs to the system.

The school system was going to have to pay to remove steel supports that had been put in for the dome if the board didn’t receive donations to complete it.

“I want to say thank you to the Wallace family for their support and partnership related to this project,” Wagner’s statement concluded.

The new administration building is going up in the 500 block of North Main Street. When the contractor started putting up the dome supports, the school held an emergency meeting on July 15 to figure out what to do. The board set a deadline for raising the funds — Friday.

Mona Wallace said the family was donating the additional funds because they believed in the Rowan-Salisbury School System.

“We want to support the administrators and teachers who foster the education of our children,” she said. “Moreover, we trust and fully support the amazing efforts of Dr. Lynn Moody and the school board to make our school system even better. Our family recognizes the importance of a collaborative, efficient, and effective education system not only for our youth, but for the growth and well-being of Rowan County.”

The Wallaces have been instrumental in getting the administration building off the ground. They agreed to a land swap, trading the North Main property that they owned for the school system’s offices on Ellis Street. They allowed the system to continue using the offices while the new structure was being built.

Though city and county schools merged in 1989, the system has been operating out of the former city schools office on Ellis Street and the former county schools office in East Spencer — as well as several other locations — as county commissioners and school board members debated the central office off and on through the years.

The Wallaces’ $320,196 gift follows an earlier $60,000 contribution they made for the dome.

Ground was broken for the $8.5 million building in April.