With a mighty roar, Holy Trinity Catholic School students put an exclamation mark on a blessing ceremony on Sept. 20 for a new portable complex built to handle the school's “explosive” growth.
When it opened during the 2010-11 school year, the school had 45 students.
At the start of this school year, the school welcomed 180 students.
This 300 per cent increase in enrolment has meant the school, which was originally built for roughly 130 students, had to add two new permanent portables capable of holding up to 60 students.
Flanked by the school's students, teachers and staff, as well as Red Deer Catholic Regional Schools superintendent of schools Paul Mason, Father Maurice Okolie led the blessing ceremony where he shared a few short prayers and sprinkled holy water across the new complex that is attached seamlessly to the north part of the school.
The first day of occupancy for the new complex was Sept. 16.
Principal Mike Cellini, who is in his first year at the school, said the school was built with expansion in mind and in total it can accommodate up to 10 portables.
The maximum capacity of the school, if all 10 portables are built, is between 400 and 450 students and Cellini said there's nothing to suggest the school won't keep growing.
“If we follow this past record of our growth, we'll probably hit 200 (students) next year.”
The school would likely adjust its space use to accommodate that number of students, however, before any new portables are built in the future, he added.
Because of the growth, the school has added a second full-time kindergarten class this year and this is the first year where Grade 9 is offered.
When it opened in 2011, the school offered classes from pre-kindergarten to Grade 6 and the staff complement was two teachers, a principal, a secretary and an aide.
Staff faced the challenge at that time of having up to three grades in each class.
Today, the school has 16 staff including nine teachers with each grade having its own teacher.
“The more we grow, the more we fit into that standard model of education,” Cellini said.
The school's growth, he said, is linked to the expansion of the town as well as some student transfers from other schools in Olds.
He added the local Catholic parish worked for more than a decade to have the school built and now that's it's up and running, many people are sending their children to the school.
“There's a strong Catholic community in Olds and there has been for a long time,” Cellini said. “We've been blessed with explosive growth which new schools seem to have.”
