Construction of the new Quw’utsun Secondary School in Duncan has passed a milestone with the installation of the final steel girder and the last concrete pour — almost two years after the initial groundbreaking.
The new $86-million school is set to be completed by September 2024, replacing the existing school, which is more than 70 years old.
“It’s tired, it’s time to put Cowichan Secondary to bed and celebrate the opening of Quw’utsun Secondary,” said Cowichan Valley School Board chair Cathy Schmidt. “We’re saying goodbye to the old chapter and hello to the new.”
Schmidt noted that the new school will include a robotics lab and “beautiful bays” for automotive, woodwork and metalwork classes.
It will also have a much-larger gymnasium and a neighbourhood learning centre housing the school’s Indigenous Language and Culture Centre, community programs and office space for Island Health.
The current school was built in 1950 and had several additions through 1998. It was identified in 2004 as needing seismic improvements.
The school board announced in March that the new school would have the traditional First Nations spelling of its name — Quw’utsun rather than the anglicized Cowichan, after consultation with elders, staff and Indigenous students.
The region is home to the Cowichan Tribes, B.C.’s largest single First Nations group, with over 5,000 members, and the school is designed to have a longhouse style, with details like large timbers and wood-like siding.
“We’ve done a lot of work with our Indigenous partners in the project,” said Schmidt, a 1987 graduate of what is often referred to as “Cow High.”
She said the idea of replacing Cow High was raised as early as 1990, when the principal at the time was promised a new facility.
The new school is being built across the street from the existing one on a 5.3-hectare site bought by the Cowichan Valley School District in 2012. It will have room for 1,100 students, up from about 900, with room to add classrooms and increase capacity to 1,500.
Work began in December 2021 on the site, once home to municipal baseball fields and adjacent to the Cowichan Community Centre, the Cowichan Aquatic Centre and Vancouver Island University’s Cowichan campus.
The province will contribute $83.8 million to the project through its Seismic Mitigation Program. The school district is providing $2.2 million.
Schmidt said the Education Ministry will determine what happens with the existing school building, which will be discussed with First Nations and local politicians.
Duncan Mayor Michelle Staples said she’s excited to see the new school take shape. “There’s been a lot of people involved to take it where it is,” she said. “A whole new generation gets to go to a brand-new school.”
North Cowichan Mayor Rob Douglas, a 2000 graduate of Cowichan Secondary, said he is looking forward to his two daughters attending the new school.
Douglas said that North Cowichan and Duncan share a vision for the area around the school called the University Village Local Area Plan, which aims to have venues like the community centre, VIU campus and high school situated together and integrated with downtown.
“It’s the long-term plan for that area and the new high school is part of that concept.”
Meanwhile, the Nanaimo-Ladysmith School District has said it is hoping for a replacement for Nanaimo District Secondary School, which also dates to the 1950s; it has 1,680 students in a building meant for 1,550.
All of the district’s six secondary schools and one alternative secondary school have been growing, district secretary-treasurer Mark Walsh said.
The Greater Victoria School District has a nearly new secondary facility to look forward to, with the refurbished Victoria High School due to open in January after a $79.7-million upgrade and expansion. As with Cowichan Secondary, seismic concerns were part of the reason the project went ahead.
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