Alayne McGregor
A long-planned-for new French public school in Dalhousie finally received provincial funding last month.
On April 29, the Ontario government announced $14.5M in funding for a new building for l’École Élémentaire Publique Louise-Arbour. The school has been temporarily housed at 175 Beech Street, in a former Catholic school building, since 2017.
In a press release, the Conseil des Écoles Publiques de l’Est de l’Ontario (CEPEO) said that the new school building would provide 449 JK to Grade 6 student spaces, 49 new licensed child care spaces, and three new child care rooms.
CEPEO President Jacinthe Marcil said the school’s community had been awaiting this announcement for years, and it would consolidate the place of public education in French in the heart of the national capital.
The city’s Corso Italia Secondary Plan shows a possible school site at 1010 Somerset Street West near Preston, to the north of the Gladstone Village development.
In 2021. the city signed a two-year memorandum of understanding with the CEPEO to explore the feasibility of including a primary school within the 1010 Somerset development.
The CEPEO said it would reveal the new school site in downtown Ottawa “in the coming months,” and expected the new building to open for the 2024-2025 school year.
A press release from MPP Sam Oosterhoff, parliamentary assistant to the minister of education, said the school would be “state-of-the-art,” accessible, and have modern ventilation systems.
Dalhousie Community Association President Catherine Boucher said that, assuming the school is located at the Gladstone Village site, “this is great news for us.
“You can’t build good communities without good schools, and this will add to our already excellent schools and help meet the needs of all the new residents coming to Dalhousie in the next few years.”