Location announced for new joint-use school in Regina

Students crowded around the podium Tuesday morning, listening, watching and playing with grass as politicians announced the location for the new joint-use school where they will end up graduating Grade 8 in a few years.

The school will replace Imperial Community School and McDermid Community School on the public side and St. Peter School and St. Michael Community School on the Catholic side.

On Tuesday, the province and divisions announced the new building will be built on the same block where Imperial exists now. However, where Imperial’s entrance is on Broad Street — one of the main roads in the city — the entrance for the new school will be on Hamilton Street, on the back side of that block.

It will include the four schools, able to hold 800 pre-K to Grade 8 students at opening and could expand to 1,000 if necessary. It will also have 51 child-care spaces, a community space with a kitchen, and an accessible playground with a spray pad outside.

Government announced the location for the new joint-use school to serve part of north Regina, to be built on the same block as the current Imperial Community School on June 27, 2023. (Lisa Schick/980 CJME)

“The new school will serve not only as a school, but also as a hub where our students, our staff and our families can learn, thrive and connect for generations to come,” Education Minster Dustin Duncan said in his remarks.

Mayor Sandra Masters said the facility will be a hub for programs and recreation and will enhance people’s quality of life.

“I think what’s going to be built here will be quite spectacular for the community and accessible and make it, for children on their summer break, a place that’s joyous, not just for school year with a state-of-the-art educational facility but with accessible and enhanced recreational facilities,” said Masters.

Construction is expected to start on the new facility this fall, with completion expected in time for the school to be open in 2025. Classes will continue at Imperial while construction is ongoing.

“There’s been a lot of work behind the scenes in terms of the design work (and) in terms of identifying the location,” said Duncan. “School divisions would have looked at all of the four existing schools that this is replacing and I think it was pretty clear that this has a big enough footprint, more than the other three, that it could accommodate not only the construction of a new school while school continues here until the school does open in 2025.”

The divisions have been working toward this project for about 10 years but it only got approval in the provincial budget in 2020. Duncan said these projects take time but the government wanted to make sure parents in the area knew it hadn’t been forgotten about.

Duncan couldn’t say the exact cost of the new building as the work hasn’t been tendered out yet, but he did say it’s expected to be higher than was first thought due to inflation. The minister said other projects have had to add 25 per cent or more to the cost.

“We have factored that in when it comes to looking at the budgets for these projects to be able to move them forward to tender,” said Duncan.

Harbour Landing school

The education minister couldn’t give an update Tuesday on how work is coming on the second joint-use school needed in Regina’s Harbour Landing area.

In March, a location was decided for the school, but a school has been needed since the doors opened on the current joint-use building in that neighbourhood due to overcrowding.

“I think all the partners are working hard to finalize the plans to be able to move that forward,” said Duncan.

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