Sir Winston Churchill Secondary School (St. Catharines)

Sir Winston Churchill Secondary School is a Canadian secondary school located in St. Catharines, Ontario. It is one of eight public secondary schools in the city, and is situated in the community of Glenridge. It is administered by the District School Board of Niagara.

History

Sir Winston was founded in 1959. It was named after the British Prime Minister, who led the United Kingdom through the Second World War.

Facilities

Its campus contains a football/soccer/lacrosse field, a track, a parking lot, and a two-story building. The building includes a gymnasium with multiple changing rooms for boys and girls as well as showers, a weight room known as the cage, and an auditorium. A brand new two-level cafeteria was unveiled in the 2011/2012 school year. The old cafeteria has been converted into a larger library, while the old library has been converted into two classrooms. Furthermore, there are now elevators available to the library for the use of injured or handicapped students.

The campus in November 2006

Official logo

The school is one of the most technology-based schools in the area, having classes such as Communications Technology (Com-Tech) and hosting a Specialist High Skills Major program in Film and Television Production. The school recently opened a new broadcast studio on the main floor, outfitted with studio lighting and high definition video cameras, that is used to broadcast the morning announcements – a student-run program called SWCTV News.^[1]

Renovations over the summer of 2013 have given the school 6 new science labs and 4 new computer labs.

In May 2016, it was announced that the school had received a grant to have a multi-sport turf football field added, as well as a state-of-the-art recording studio installed for the 2016/2017 school year.

The school is also built on the same plans as another school in the city, Laura Secord Secondary School, located only 6.3 km away.^[2]

Extended French program

Sir Winston Churchill's Extended French program has been in existence for over 30 years. The school offers the program through grades 9 to 12 to students who participated in Extended French previously in elementary school. Twelve of the forty credits that an Extended French student completes will be taught in French. These are mainly core subjects like French, Math, Science and Social Sciences.^[3]

Sports

Sir Winston Churchill offers several extracurricular sports activities to its students, including football, swimming, cross country running, track and field, volleyball, basketball, soccer, lacrosse, rowing, and others.^[4]

Volleyball

The Sir Winston Churchill volleyball team has won city championships four years in a row (2006, 2007, 2008, 2009) and reached the provincial finals at the OFSAA in 2009. Sir Winston Churchill regained their reputation as a solid volleyball school when the Senior Boys Volleyball team captured the Zone 4 title for AAA Volleyball in 2012, 2013, and 2014 while advancing to SOSSA for three years in a row. They have had a few players go on to compete at the university level, Queen's University, McMaster University, the University of Guelph and Sacred Heart University to name a few.

Dance Team

The Sir Winston Churchill competitive dance team is a group of dancers who learn choreography throughout the school year and perform at various competitions. Some competitions include Strive Dance Challenge, Niagara's Best Dance Crew, and Dance Starz.

Clubs

Chess

Sir Winston Churchill won the St. Catharines City Championship three years in a row (2007, 2008, 2009).

Robotics

Team Winston (known as The Sir Winston Churchill Robodogs until the beginning of the 2013/2014 season) has been competing in the First Technology Challenge (2007–2009) and the VEX robotics competitions (2009–present). They have competed in the world championships six times (2008–2011 and 2013–2014). While participating in the championship, the team place 8th in 2008, and then they took 3rd place in both 2009 and 2010, however they did not get picked for the elimination stages during the 2011 championship and did not qualify for the 2012 championship. The team went on to compete in the 2013 and 2014 championships, not getting picked for eliminations in 2013, but were picked in 2014 before being knocked out in division quarter-finals. This club is run by some of the Technology teachers at the school, with previous students and parents helping when needed. As of the 2013/2014 year, the club has 5 robots registered: 211A, 211S, 211W, 211C and 211Z.

Schoolreach

Schoolreach is a competition between schools based on knowledge of trivia. Sir Winston Churchill has participated consistently in the competition for many years.

Notable alumni

Graduation year is in parentheses:

• Malin Åkerman (1995), Swedish Canadian actress and model
• Doug Favell (1965), NHL goaltender for the Philadelphia Flyers and the Toronto Maple Leafs
• Jeffrey Finley (2010), CFL defensive lineman for the Montreal Alouettes
• Karla Homolka (1988), convicted serial killer
• Tammy Homolka (grade 10 student at death), murder victim of Karla Homolka and Paul Bernardo
• Paul Jenkins (1965), Canadian economist, former Senior Deputy Governor and former Chief Operating Officer of the Bank of Canada
• Wade MacNeil (2000), guitarist, vocalist and founding member of the post-hardcore band Alexisonfire
• Keith Makubuya (2009), professional soccer player
• Mark Steenhuis (1996), NLL forward for the Buffalo Bandits

See also

• District School Board of Niagara
• Education in Ontario
• Extended French program

References

External links

• District School Board of Niagara
• Ontario Ministry of Education
• Sir Winston Churchill Secondary School