High school celebrates journey

Five years on from its big move, Queenstown's Wakatipu High School campus at Remarkables Park is complete.

Principal Oded Nathan welcomed hundreds of guests to an official opening last week.

"We now finally have the school in its final form," he said. "So, we thought it was really appropriate now, after five years and quite a long journey, for us to have this opportunity to come together as a community . . . to celebrate this milestone."

The school began as Queenstown District High School, in Stanley Street, with a roll of 23 pupils in 1937.

It moved to Gorge Road / Fryer Street in 1975, where it remained until 2017, before relocating to the purpose-built 10,500sqm campus in Remarkables Park, opening in 2018.

The new school's capacity was 1200 students but it was always the plan to expand the facilities to cater for a capacity of 1800.

Phase two, which included a new north and south wing, as well as a 1767sqm gymnasium, began in 2020 and opened in January this year. The current roll is 1350 students.

"We also have nearly 120 staff and in terms of options for students, our juniors alone get to choose about 40 different options from 20-plus subjects. So, whereas you had six subjects that you had to learn back in 1937, the opportunities that are available to our rangatahi are really vast at this point."

Nathan also thanked the Wakatipu High School Foundation, which is giving the school $450,000 this year alone, along with the Branches Trust, the school board, the previous principal Steve Hall and his leadership team, the construction partners, the Ministry of Education, and the staff and students.

"It is a world class facility," he said.

Ministry of Education Director of Education for Otago Southland, Julie Anderson, said WHS has a vision as a school for everyone that delivers Aotearoa best all-round education.

"And these buildings and the planning that has gone into these will support that vision. They are provided for everybody," Anderson said.

Over the past five years, she said, the teachers, students and leadership had strived to be "part of a future-focused education that has lived up to the modern, open-plan, student-centred environment that has been created".

"A little bit different to the single cells and the winter ice zone that was the old Wakatipu High School [on Gorge Road]".

She also thanked the school community for its support, and praised the teachers. "All credit to the staff who have developed new ways of teaching that can engage and excite students to learn in both collaborative and independent ways."

Mayor Glyn Lewers, who has a son at the school and another on the way, praised WHS for its "richly diverse culture", with 43 different ethnicities.

He told the students to make the most of their time at the school.

"You'll be presented with wonderful opportunities, grab them with both hands, and have fun, and remember to look out for each other."