Improvements to three local Catholic schools has been approved by the Windsor Essex Catholic District School Board.
The Board of Trustees met Tuesday evening, with three separate reports being approved for nearly $9-million in improvements.
Villanova High School has been approved for an Air Handling Unit replacement, at a cost of $4.5-million. Work will start this July, and is expected to be completed by the end of March 2025.
The board also approved $630,000 for indoor renovations at St. Anne Catholic Skilled Trades and Learning Centre. This work will include upgrades to current change rooms, and to the gymnasium.
Work will be done throughout the summer months, and will be completed by the end of August 2024.
Meanwhile, the board also approved $3.8-million in phase one upgrades at Brennan High School and Corpus Christi Middle School. These improvements include washroom upgrades, window replacements in a few classrooms, a cosmetology space in the high school, as well as accessibility upgrades.
This work will start at the end of June, and is slated to be completed by mid-February 2025.
Fulvio Valentinis, Chair of the WECDSB, says these are absolutely necessary improvements.
"What it's going to do is it's going to make sure that our schools will be functioning better, both for students and for staff. If you look at the total there, it's almost $9-million which is a considerable amount of money that we're spending, but it's certainly something that needed to be done."
He says while some of the improvements are more 'maintenance' work, there are some exciting additions.
"We're especially excited about some of them, a couple of them, I know at Brennan High School, the new cosmetology technology space because that's going to be a wonderful addition for the new cosmetology program, which will be starting there in September. And so that's going to be very, very welcomed by the students, and they're excited about that program."
He says the improvements at the St. Anne's Skilled Trades and Learning Centre will be great for the sports academy, which had to move from Central Park Athletics.
"If you look at in Tecumseh at the St. Anne's Skilled Training Centre we're looking at improvements to the gymnasium and change rooms for some of our sports academy students. And again that's something which is needed, and which they're going to certainly look forward to having."
These improvements have allocated funding set aside in the budget, as well as some funds being provided by the Ministry of Education.
Valentinis says it's exciting to approve these improvements just a week after the province announced $3.7-million in additions at St. Joseph's Catholic High School.