The province has announced a new school for kindergarten to grade 8 in Winnipeg’s Waterford Green neighbourhood.

The 76,430-sq.-ft. school will be built on Jefferson Avenue east of King Edward Street and is expected to be ready in time for the 2020 school year. The dual-track facility will be designed and constructed for 600 English and French immersion students, with the potential to accommodate nine additional classrooms or 225 additional students. It will feature a child-care centre with 54 preschool and 20 infant spaces, and additional space for a nursery school program.

Other features include two science laboratories, a science, technology, electronics and mathematics (STEM) lab, a large gymnasium open to the community, an art room, home economics lab and industrial arts lab.

“Winnipeg School Division welcomes families moving into the new Castlebury Meadows and Waterford Green developments and the soon-to-be-built school students in nursery to Grade 8 will be attending,” said Pauline Clarke, chief superintendent and CEO of Winnipeg School Division. “The new school will help address some of the need for this growing community in Winnipeg, and we’re also very happy to offer French immersion at this school, a program that is also in very high demand in our division.”

The province announced the selection of LM Architects as the project’s prime consultant, a firm with a long history of designing quality school facilities, such as the middle school addition currently under construction in Neepawa. The Waterford Green school will achieve LEED Silver and Manitoba Hydro Power Smart energy standards.