YARMOUTH, N.S. – A new elementary school in Yarmouth is taking shape, with construction well underway on Parade Street.
The school – to be called Yarmouth Elementary School (YES) – will replace Yarmouth Central School and the former South Centennial School. Construction is not scheduled to be complete until the end of June 2019.
Steve Stoddart, director of operations for the Tri-County Regional Centre for Education (formerly the Tri-County Regional School Board), says a School Steering Team made up of board management staff, teachers and former school board members, as well as School Advisory Council, home and school reps, and student reps from Yarmouth Central and South Centennial schools, worked with representatives from the departments of Education and Early Childhood Development and Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal when it came to the design of the school.
It will be a two-storey building with 14 classrooms, a music room, a learning centre, a resource room, library, a seminar room, a guidance room and other open-space learning areas. The gymnasium of the former Yarmouth Junior High School is being incorporated into the design of the school. The school will also have the pre-primary program on site.
Stoddart says there are unique features being incorporated into the school.
“There is an area called a Da Vinci Studio, which is a unique open learning space. The stairway to the second level is called an Academic Stair, which is another unique learning space. The library is in another open space that is unlike the typical library we know,” he says.
The school is being built on the part of the property that housed the P.A. Best Education Centre. Both that building and the junior high building were demolished to make way for the new school.
A parking lot will be on the Parade Street-Brunswick Street corner of the property, and there will also be a drop-off loop. The entrance for the parking lot and drop-off loop will be on Brunswick Street, not Parade Street. There will be a bus loop off of Parade Street.
The remainder of the property will include green space, walkways, a playground, light duty asphalt play surfaces and a separate early learning play area. The sports field behind the old Yarmouth high school will be used for this elementary school.
The school is also being designed to meet environmental and efficiency LEED standards.
The construction tender went to Avondale Construction, whose bid came in at $14,160,949.
In March 2013 the Tri-County Regional School Board voted to close Central, South Centennial and Arcadia elementary schools. In June 2016 Arcadia and South Centennial schools finally closed. Arcadia students were moved into Plymouth School in September 2016 and South Centennial students were moved into Yarmouth Central that fall.
After the new elementary school opens, Yarmouth Central will be turned back over to the Town of Yarmouth. Years ago, the school board turned the former Yarmouth high school on Parade Street back to the town. That building remains for sale.
The former Arcadia school was turned back to the Municipality of Yarmouth, which sold the building. A sign proclaiming this to be the future site of Th’YARC now sits at roadside.
