New French-language school coming to Hamilton

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The education minister was greeted by a large group of French-language high school students from two different boards today as she was set to announce a brand new school coming to the Hamilton area in the near future. It’s a building that will have both groups of students spending a whole lot more time together.

It was a bi-lingual celebration at Hamilton city hall earlier today. Ontario’s Education Minister Mitzie Hunter announced that in the fall of 2018 a new $25-million provincially funded French-language school will open it’s doors to up to 800 students in the Greater Hamilton Area. Both the catholic and public French-language school boards joined forces to make this happen. Each board will have it’s own side of a single building and students will share a communal space in the middle.

Academie Catholique Mere-Teresa and Georges P. Vanier are both older buildings that lack the space and equipment some modern schools enjoy today. Once the new school opens up on the east mountain, these two schools will be vacant. The education minister says having two boards share one new building could be a tactic used for other school boards in the future.

According to provincial records, enrollment in French-language schools in Ontario has experienced a steady decline for the past six years. Both schools only have about 250-300 students each so they hope that a new facility with state of the art equipment and space could attract more students to make French a bigger part of their education.