The students of Ecole Notre Dame des Vallees, Cochrane’s francophone school, have found a permanent location alongside Quigley Drive’s Mitford Middle School, as announced during a ground-breaking ceremony March 15.
“Schools aren’t just places to learn — they are hubs in a community,” said Ron Casey, MLA for Banff-Cochrane.
In this case, it is a hub of a community that is quickly growing, said Adele Scott, principal of the francophone school that currently calls the portables at the Riverview Drive location home.
“The quality of the education is exceptional, considering the lack of infrastructure we have,” said Scott.
“I’m in awe at what we can accomplish in spite of our shortcomings.”
With students ranging from kindergarten to Grade 8, Scott said there have been classes in the past that have required the students to travel off-campus to be able to learn. For instance, she said students are transported to the Cochrane CookHouse for a cooking class.
Currently, the school has 93 students, but the new location will have room for enrollment to grow to 250, said Scott.
Although not currently offered, she added the school hopes to include Grade 9 classes down the road.
A francophone school differs from French-immersion programs by offering classes in French, in a cultural setting. French-immersion programs, on the other hand, teach French as a second language.
Scott said construction could begin as early as the week of March 18.
The new Ecole Notre Dame des Vallees is one of 35 Alberta schools to be built or modernized at an estimated cost of $550 million, as announced by the Alberta government in 2011.
The Cochrane school is anticipated to be finished by September 2014.
