The beginning of a new school year is upon us, and with that comes the first day of classes at the new Niverville High School, which will open its doors to more than 300 students on Wednesday, September 4.

Before getting into the nuts and bolts about what makes this new facility so special, let’s review the timeline. Because although it might seem like the school has been a long time coming, it’s surprising how quickly the project has gone from pipedream to reality.

In the spring of 2017, the province indicated a new Niverville school was a priority. Then, on a cool and rainy August 1, 2017, local officials gathered in an empty field to announce that the school was definitely going to happen. At the time, the deal was remarkable in that it had come together in a single month over the summer, an unusual occurrence of three levels of government and the private sector all reaching final terms during a time of year when the gears of government tend to grind all too slowly. The speed of the announcement caught many people off-guard.

Eight months later, shovels were in the ground.

Now, 16 months after that, the doors are open—and once you walk through them, you step into a building so sparkling new and state-of-the-art in its attention to detail that you have to pinch yourself to remember that, yes, you’re still in Niverville. 

First Day of Classes 

So what can students expect Wednesday morning when they walk inside for the first time?

“Well, we hope that there will be a lot of awe,” says Principal Kimberley Funk. “We want to just give them time to wander, explore, soak it all in. We’re not having regular classes on the first day, so we’ve developed a whole first day that’s just a welcome to Niverville High School and orientation day. A relationship-building day. They’ll just get their feet in here, make connections with old friends, new friends, get to know teachers, get to know the building. Where is everything? How does it work? It’ll be a fun-filled day with a lot of new things.”

In addition to helping students get situated, according to the school website there’s going to be a free hot dog lunch to mark the day. 

Spacious Foyer 

When you first step inside, you find yourself in an open, breezy foyer that opens up to the second floor. This area leads seamlessly into the spacious multipurpose room, the gymnasium, and the Learning Commons. A full-service kitchen is right next-door, allowing for food service when special occasions call for it, and there will be café tables and chairs for 80 to 100 students to eat here, with spillover into nearby designated classrooms.

“One of the cool things I love about this space is it was very much designed for a lot of natural light,” says Randy Dueck, superintendent of the Hanover School Division. “It’s the gathering place of the school. We’ve got glass doors into the Learning Commons, and openness right to the gym and up to the top through to the skylight. And, well, it’s going to be this open all the time. It’s truly as open as we can make it. I think it’s a really well designed central area.”

He says that although the Public School Finance Board had already provided for a lot of open space in this part of the school, the school division threw in a “good chunk” of money to make it even bigger.

“With our trustees, we deliberately said we wanted another five-foot strip here,” he says. “We wanted this even more open… it’s something the Hanover school board specifically paid for.”

Funk adds that it makes a big difference to arrive every morning in a beautiful space with lots of light and good energy.

“It really does improve your mood,” she says. “It makes people happy and feel good, so I think that’s going to be a huge component to staff and student well-being, just being part of building a culture where we love being here… Also, this space will allow people to move outside classrooms and work in small settings and different settings. It provokes thinking in different ways… all these little spaces and open spaces throughout the school provide different opportunities for learning and we’re really excited about that.” 

Learning Commons 

The Learning Commons, to the east of the enormous foyer and multipurpose area, is the Niverville High School’s closest equivalent to a library. It needs to be phrased that way, because it’s not quite a library in the traditional way we’ve come to think of one. Funk says the new school rethinks the library concept, coming up with something new and innovative.

The Commons is divided into two distinct areas. One features a series of taller shelving units for books, and some couches and tables where students can read, do schoolwork, and settle down in a quieter environment.

The other area is a more interactive space, with a large touchscreen for students to gather around, as well as couches and tables. There will also be a coffee shelf installed, as well as charging ports—although these features hadn’t yet been installed as of Wednesday, August 28 when media toured the facility.

“You can tell that we don’t have a traditional library in the sense that, you know, it’s all enclosed and it’s a quiet, no-talking place,” says Funk. “While we definitely promote literacy and reading, and there’s a nice spot to do that, this will be a very collaborative learning space where teachers can bring down classes… Again, there’s just lots of opportunities to [get out of] enclosed environments and broaden throughout the school.”

One might expect computer stations in a space like this, but Dueck says that a conscious decision was made to exclude them. After all, every student from Grade 9 to 12 will have access to their own, school-supplied Chromebook laptop for use in school and at home. 

The Gymnasium 

On the west side of the multipurpose area, students and visitors can step into the gymnasium, which is quite a bit larger than the one we’re used to at the former Niverville Collegiate. This, says Dueck, is now the standard size for school gymnasiums in Manitoba, although the one in Niverville High School is taller than any other in the school division. The walls are adorned with the school colours—red, grey, and charcoal. Along the top of the north wall are a row of remote-controlled windows to let in natural light.

An impressive feature of the gym are the bleachers, which can be separated from the wall with the press of a button on a handy control device.

“What’s nice about that is you can pull out as many rows as you need,” says Funk. “So when we do have to split the gym and pull the curtain and have two basketball games going on, we can just have separate rows for that. But when we’re doing full court, we can bring it all the way out and have seating for 300.”

Perhaps the most readily identifiable feature of the gym is the new Panthers logo emblazoned at centre court.

“We knew that the Panthers meant a lot to this community,” says Dueck. “We weren’t going to mess with the name Panthers! The middle school is still the Panthers, too, but we felt there needs to be some distinguishment between the two… So we’ve updated the actual image of the Panthers and there have been some small tweaks.”

The gym opens onto a fitness room, a first for Niverville students. This brightly lit room surrounded by windows with a west-facing view will come equipped with stationary bikes, treadmills, rowers, and weight-lifting equipment. The room, covered with cushioned sports flooring, will also include a screen which can be used to pull up group workout videos.

As for change rooms, Dueck points out that their layout reflects an important divisional philosophy.

“We have included more privacy stalls than would be the norm,” he says. “I think the Public Schools Finance Board has seen what we’ve done here, like it, and are probably going to move in that direction with a lot of other schools. If you think of yourself when you were in school and in the change room, there’s a lot of great reasons to have privacy stalls. Student health issues. Student body issues. [The change rooms] were intended initially to be more open, but we said we wanted more stalls.”

As visitors walk around the building, they’ll note that there’s no need to flick light switches. In every room of the school, from classrooms and labs to washrooms to the Learning Commons, motion sensors detect when people enter and gradually dim the lights up. The washrooms, too, are equipped with motion-activated toilets, faucets, and dryers. 

Life Skills Suite 

One of the spaces in the school that is new to Niverville is the Life Skills Suite.

“There’s obviously a demographic of our students that come with special needs, and this room is [for them],” says Funk. “It’s got a full-functioning kitchen that allows us to focus on developing specific life skills that students will need after they leave us.”

This suite will be the home to students in Grades 9 to 12, of course, but the school also has a program for special-needs students between the ages of 18 to 21. This includes those who are blind, hearing-impaired, wheelchair-bound, or have intellectual deficits.

“Some of [these students] stay with us for another three years until they transition into adulthood,” she says. “So we can offer them different options here, and often it’s a combination school-slash-work-placement. We have space for physiotherapy in here, too, for students that need that, and then a full grooming room that has all the other needs addressed… This space is really fabulous in terms of giving them a place to make their own.”

Dueck points out that the Public Schools Finance Board mandates these suites in all new schools in the province. 

Interactive Digital Media Program 

With the new school comes a new vocational opportunity for Niverville students: the Interactive Digital Media (IDM) program, which until now has only been available at the Steinbach Regional Secondary School.

The focal point of the program is the digital learning lab.

“We love this space,” says Dueck. “Initially when we started to develop this space, the Public Schools Finance Board referenced it as two computer labs. And we said, ‘No, we don’t talk about computer labs anymore. There’s no such thing.’ These are digital learning labs and we consider them quite a bit differently.”

The lab can be divided into two rooms and comes equipped with an 85-inch interactive digital screen. There’s also a sound booth with high-end audio equipment. All in all, Dueck says the school division received a grant of $165,000 specifically for the equipment in this lab.

Funk says Interactive Digital Media is a full eight-credit program that students can participate in through Grades 9 to 12.

“We have all our Grade 9 students doing the introductory course to expose them to the program and get them excited about what’s coming,” she says. “This is brand new for them. And then we’re hoping to find ways to mix that up and cross into business, arts, and lots of the other disciplines. How do we use the digital media piece in science and social studies? We’re not going to just have traditional classes in here. This program will filter throughout the school and be very collaborative.”

The teacher who has been hired to build the program, Funk says, is a graphic designer by trade and has lots of experience and connections in that industry. 

A New Standard for Classroom Design 

All classrooms in the school come equipped with interactive touchscreens, replacing the projectors that have until now been standard equipment throughout the Hanover School Division. Dueck says there’s a little bit of extra cost to upgrade from projectors to monitors, but that he expects these costs will probably be recouped over time.

In the days leading up to the school’s opening, teachers have been engaged in specialized training to familiarize them with the new screens. A training seminar was in progress during the August 28 media tour.

Another feature of the new classrooms is that instead of desks students will orient themselves around tables of varying heights. The taller tables along the back walls of the classrooms will allow students a different vantage point and the chance to change things up.

The rooms also feature sound-deadening panels around the tops of the walls and ceilings to create better acoustics. Also, each room comes equipped with three banks of lights that can be controlled separately to dim or brighten different parts of the class.

“This is something that the teachers are just thrilled about,” says Funk. 

Science Rooms 

The school has two science classrooms and two science labs upstairs. The science classrooms are a little bit larger than a regular classroom, and they have sinks and counters. A prep room straddles the two adjoining science classrooms.

The science labs, on the other hand, have more sinks, as well as gas hook-ups, a shower, and an eyewash station. The tabletops are chemical-resistant, so that experiments don’t accidentally wreck the furniture. Duelling fume hoods can clear out fumes in a hurry, which is a standard science lab feature in Manitoba.

Dueck is also proud of a small room between the science labs which will be used as a garden, and its hallway-facing windows ensure that all students will get a good look at it as they go back and forth between classes. 

The Art Room 

The second-floor art room has one of the best views, with a bank of windows overlooking the front street. Although not fully set up yet at the time of the tour, several art pieces had already been erected on the walls.

“Art rooms typically aren’t the cleanest room in a school,” says Dueck. “They have stuff all over because they’re creative and interactive. So it’s a room we fully expect to get a little bit messy over time.”

The art room comes with a kiln, easels, drafting tables, and a pottery wheel. Also: art donkeys. What’s an art donkey, you might ask? They look a little bit like bench presses, but their intended use is far from it. Artists straddle the seat and mount their easels on the donkey’s “neck.”

A display case for art projects is also on the way, but it’s currently on back order. 

Phase Two 

As a reminder, currently only the first phase of the school is ready to move in. The second phase, which includes the drama room, the band room, and a childcare centre, is in the final stages of construction. Although Dueck says it’s too early to commit to a timeframe, he says those spaces are humming along and will likely open ahead of schedule.

Even without a band room, though, the band program will continue this year without disruption. There will be two bands, one for Grades 9–10 and another for Grades 11–12. students will be bussed to Niverville Middle School for classes which are scheduled to take place every other day.

When completed, the school will have a corridor linking it to the Community Resource and Recreation Centre (CRRC). Dueck is enthusiastic about the school being located on the larger campus and points to the many opportunities this will create.

“We’re creating a really special campus here,” he says. “To be able to partner together with the Town of Niverville and to see the [CRRC] starting to go up over here, with the gym space, with the young kids interactive play area that they’re going to have in there, with the arena… there’s just a boatload of possibilities. Over time we’re going to have to sort out what those possibilities look like and what a campus looks like as opposed to us thinking just about a school.” 

Opportunity of a Lifetime 

“From that moment [on August 1, 2017] when we stood in a bit of rain at the field, making the announcement that the school would come, maybe we were standing right about here,” Dueck says from the school’s foyer at the end of the tour. “And here we are! It’s for real. It’s pretty cool.”

As principal, Funk’s eagerness for the first day of school is palpable. Although she acknowledges that a big push is needed over the next few days to get everything ready for students.

“It’s all hands on deck right now,” she concludes. “It’s been a beehive of activity with teachers moving in, furniture being assembled, floors being cleaned. Every room has something going on in it, but we will get it done. It actually feels quite surreal. So many things have had to happen in order to get to this point—being involved in the construction aspect, picking different colours and all the technology, choosing your staff, focusing on the learning opportunities, bringing in the right people to do that, building a team so that we can just really support student learning and get them excited about being here… it is an opportunity of a lifetime, and I’ve enjoyed every minute of it.”