This article was previously published on GuelphToday.
After six years, ground has finally been broken for a new public high school in Guelph.
The $61.1 million, 900 pupil school’s target opening date is September 2026.
Upper Grand District School Board staff, trustees, architects of the school, city councillors, Mayor Cam Guthrie and MPP Mike Schreiner came to break ground on Thursday.
There is still a tender process the project has to go through for the construction of the school at 388 Arkell Rd.
As for the design of the building, Hossak Architecture is behind it and have worked with the UGDSB on other school designs before.
The school doesn't yet have a name.
The 108,000 square feet, two floor school is set to have a gymnasium, computer engineering and robotics facilities, cafetorium with a double sided stage adjacent to a music room, an indoor learning common centre that leads into an outdoor student plaza, a 400 metre track field outside and more features.
“Guelph is growing and we have to have the school ready for future expansions when you’re able to attain future funding from the ministry,” said Blair Capling, capital and renewal project manager at UGDSB, in an interview with GuelphToday.
If you don’t look to the future it's difficult to make those moves when the time comes, he continued.
“But right now we’re designing to 900. Generally, you build to the number and use portables to supplement to a point that you’ve passed a critical mass and then you go for financing from the ministry and then you build your addition,” said Capling.
Sustainability was also kept in mind for the design such as including air source heat pumps to heat and cool the school, solar panels and energy efficient windows.
About two years ago Dilip Parmar started at UGDSB as the senior facilities manager. “I mean, a lot of the sustainability stuff hasn’t been pushed,” said Parmar, in an interview. He started bringing in more of the sustainability aspect because he knew the board could do more since it can’t just do the bare minimum. This is where heat pump technology came into play and now some schools have it as a way or partial pay to heat the buildings.
“This is going to be an example of a school that has taken sustainability to the forefront of its design, ahead of any other high schools in the area,” said Priscilla Ladouceur, principal design architect with Hossak Architecture, in an interview with GuelphToday. She hopes future students and their families and guardians will be proud of this.
UGDSB director of education Peter Sovran’s late father worked in construction as a brick layer and worked in building many schools in the province. “And he’d always say that a community is never complete until you put a school in it,” said Sovran, in his remarks at the groundbreaking.
Today is a monumental day because a school is being built in this community, he said. He brought a hard hat and wore safety boots because he considers it a construction site moving forward.
