The origins of high school in East Kildonan
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 09/10/2020 (963 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
This September marked the 100th anniversary of Prince Edward School on Brazier Street and, while most people think of it as an elementary school, it has been much more than that over its history.
The first high school in all of northeast Winnipeg, called East Kildonan Collegiate, was established at Prince Edward School in 1921 with 41 students in Grade 9. September 1922 saw Grade 10 added for a total of 74 students and in 1923, Grade 11 was added for a total of 98. In 1926-27, its last year at Prince Edward, East Kildonan Collegiate had 110 students.
In September 1927, East Kildonan Collegiate moved to the second floor of Lord Wolseley School on Henderson Highway due to a shortage of classroom space in Prince Edward, which also contained students in grades 1 through 8. Lord Wolseley also housed grades 1 to 6 on its first floor but, due the much smaller elementary population, sufficient space existed for high school students at Lord Wolseley.
In its first year at Lord Wolseley, the high school’s enrolment was 134 students and it increased rapidly in the years that followed, reaching a peak of 407 students in the 1936-37 school year — all crammed into six classrooms on the second floor and two extra classrooms created in the basement. The boys took shops classes once a week in a room in the original Polson School located on Winterton Avenue, while the girls took home economics in the annex building at the same school.
Grade 12 was first offered at East Kildonan Collegiate in the 1931-32 school year and only twice more in other, isolated years until the last year of East Kildonan Collegiate at Lord Wolseley in the 1951-52 school year.
High school was very different from what students experience today, as the school contained no library, no gym, no science rooms and no other specialty classrooms. Every student took exactly the same courses, as there was only one program for all students. To play indoor sports, such as basketball and volleyball, students had to travel to the YMCA downtown as there were no gyms in the area.
In 1952 a new school just for high school students was built at 757 Roch St. It was originally to be called East Kildonan Collegiate but was renamed Miles Macdonell Collegiate before its opening.
Jim Smith is a community correspondent for Elmwood, East Kildonan and North Kildonan. Email him at jimsmith@mts.net
Jim Smith
Jim Smith is a community correspondent for Elmwood, East Kildonan and North Kildonan. Email him at jimsmith@mts.net