New school nearing completion
By Dale Woodard on March 24, 2021.
A state-of-the-art elementary school is set to open its doors in September.Dr. Robert Plaxton Elementary School, located on Lethbridge’s south side is nearing completion and on Tuesday afternoon architects and teachers alike provided a tour of the modern facility which will house students aged Kindergarten to Grade 5.
“It’s such an exciting opportunity to start with a completely blank slate and such a modern, innovative building,” said Erin Hurkett, principal at Dr. Robert Plaxton Elementary School.
Covering an area of roughly 4,800 square metres, the school contains 15 permanent classrooms, eight modular classrooms and two project centres as well a 616 square metre gymnasium, 180 square metre library commons and a 223 square metre student gathering space.
Dr. Robert Plaxton Elementary School also features solar panels of the roof and gymnasium walls as well as an energy sources-themed playground.
“I think one of the most interesting things about the facility is it’s all run on solar energy,” said Hurkett. “It generates 105 per cent of the school’s energy. It provides a lot of opportunity for us to engage our student population in different forms of energy.”
Also part of the new school is a 37 square metre commercial kitchen, six breakout and wraparound services office spaces, 94 on-site parking stalls and eight on-street school bus parking layby areas.
The classroom are also conjoined.
“You can close them (or) you can open them up. It allow students a lot of opportunity for collaboration and teachers to do a lot of team teaching, said Hurkett, adding the commons facility — located just off the main gathering area — will be multi-purpose.
“There are lots of opportunities not just for our book exchanges, but to bring in a lot of STEM activities, the science, technology, engineering and math. We have a lot of those pieces coming into the school.”
The music room also features baffles in the ceiling to help with the sound.
“We also have baffles that look different than the ones in the music room that are in the foyer and the gym,” said Hurkett. “It just dampens the noise that’s condusive to what they’re doing in the music room.”
Dr. Robert Plaxton Elementary School offers lots of open areas for teachers to bring their classes, said Hurkett.
“They just have more room, more floor space and different kinds of seating and different ways of learning they can utlize, not just in their classroom, but in different spaces in the building.”
Director of facility services of the Lethbridge School Division and an architect Daniel Heaton said construction on Dr. Robert Plaxton Elementary School began roughly two years ago.
“The design, planning and whatnot dates years before that,” he said.
“Just like our new west side elementary school which is going to open in 2025. We just got word that we’re to start design now. So it takes about five years from government approval to when we can move in.”
Located at Fairmont Gate South, Dr. Robert Plaxton Elementary School offers expansion to the west and the south.
“There is plenty of room for houses and this building will be viable for a long time,” said Heaton, adding the Coalbanks school plan was reused for Dr. Robert Plaxton Elementary School. “What’s really interesting in Lethbridge is we build our elementary (schools) in pairs. If you look at Ecole Agnes Davidson, Lakeview School is it’s twin (as is) Park Meadows School and Nicholas Sheran School. We’ve had some other opportunties where we’ve seen what was built and changed things to spend money more wisely or make it more practical.”
The school has a capcity a capacity of 600 students, but to start there will probably be about half that number, said Hurkett.
“As the community grows we’ll have room for all of the kids who keep coming to us.” Follow @DWoodardHerald on Twitter 3
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