photo courtesy Erika Rolling/EverythingGP

By Jeff Henson/Erika Rolling

Ribbon cut to officially open new Composite High School

Sep 27, 2022 | 3:17 PM

Students, teachers, and local dignitaries were on hand Tuesday morning for the official opening of the new Grande Prairie Composite High school.

At over 16,500 square metres, the new Composite high is the largest high school north of Edmonton.

It is a fact that Grande Prairie Public School District Superintendent Sandy McDonald is particularly proud of.

“Grande Prairie Public school division is I believe the largest school division north of Edmonton, and all of the students come from the city of Grande Prairie. Having this school provides opportunities for our students and staff and our community. The scale of the building, the size of the facility, and the opportunities it presents is what excites us about this.”

The school currently houses around 1,350 students in grades 9-12, but has the capacity to hold up to 1,600 students.

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It cost $78.5 million to build, with construction starting back in November of 2019 and wrapping up earlier this year.

The school first opened its doors to students at the start of the current school year.

Principal Dennis Vobeyda says the students and staff are very excited to finally be in their new home.

“It is not only great for our staff, because they have spent the past two years really in this sense where you would see the building being built on the other side of the parking lot, and then not knowing when we are actually going to go in.”

“The students are very excited now to be the first graduating class. We have our rebranding, so yes we are extremely excited with everything that we will be able to do this year.”

Vobeyda says just like moving into a new house, there are a few things that need to be fine-tuned with the new facility.

“The thing that I hear constantly from teachers is one side of the building is a little warn and one side of the building is cool. The gym would be the cool side. It is kind of humourous – on the third floor we have some teachers and students telling us that it is 27 (degrees celsius) and then on the other side we have 18 (degrees celsius). So we have a wide range that we are trying to dial in.”

Vobeyda adds they also hope to have their commercial kitchen up and running by later this week or early next week so that they can start offering food services for their students.

The public is invited to get a first-hand look at the new facility Wednesday night, as the school hosts a community grand opening family barbecue from 4-6 pm.