A private educational institution that has operated in a small office space on High Street West for nearly four years has found a new, bigger home in a former Catholic school building.
A & L Royal International School — formerly Royal Education Academy — is a private language school that caters to international students and is focused on English as a second language (ESL). It has an ESL program and a high school for students — local and international — in grades 9 to 12.
It officially opened in October 2019 in the former Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) branch at 108-52 High Street West. Two years later, school owner Wing Lam purchased a building at 502 Sixth Avenue Northeast.
The 64-year-old building — which, over the decades, housed St. Mary School, the Holy Trinity Catholic School Division board office, and Phoenix Academy — then sat unused for 18 months before the organization began renovations six months ago.
On June 16, city hall provided the school with its occupancy permit, allowing administrators to begin moving in all the necessary furniture and equipment required to teach students.
A & L will finish this school year at its High Street location before beginning classes in its new spot in September. It will then attempt to rent out its downtown offices.
Roots School, which rents a room at the High Street location, will also move its operations to the new school and occupy three rooms downstairs.
The new location also provides the private academy with additional parking because it has only four spaces downtown. This should also benefit Roots School since it is forced to plug parking meters daily.
Principal Jeff Mathieson gave a tour of the school recently and discussed some changes the organization made, including upgrading floors in the basement.
He explained that pipes in the walls burst last winter and flooded the downstairs because someone turned off the heat. This forced the school to replace all the tiles in the hallway, classrooms and bathrooms and repaint many walls.
“So, we were having water flow up the walls, and we (had) to break the walls open and try to figure out where things came from,” Mathieson recalled.
The damage to one classroom floor was so severe that the organization had to dig down several feet, remove the crumbling infrastructure, and re-pour the concrete.
A multi-pattern carpet now covers the floor.
“So, there was a lot of work,” the principal said.
The Catholic division originally built the school in 1959 with eight classrooms since it was a kindergarten to Grade 8 venue. After the new St. Mary School was built in 1980 — across a field from the old location — the division moved in and subdivided many rooms.
When A & L took possession, the small rooms suited its needs since many classes are composed of roughly 10 to 12 pupils, Mathieson said. However, it adjusted the layout of some areas, removed some walls, installed doors between rooms, added four stand-up showers to bathrooms downstairs and made other cosmetic adjustments.
Upstairs, it installed a computer room and created a library behind the front desk. Downstairs, it has created a mini recreation room with a ping pong table, air hockey table, a foosball table, and weightlifting and cardio equipment.
While A & L is under the Ministry of Education’s jurisdiction, the academy doesn’t have to follow the same procurement policies as school divisions because it’s independent, Mathieson said. This is beneficial because he can acquire furniture through auctions at lower prices; this has saved the school $100,000.
These savings included purchasing combined bathroom countertops and cabinets for $300 per unit, compared to $6,000 per combo unit brand-new. Furthermore, it cost him $800 to purchase all four stand-up showers, whereas brand new would be $2,500 per unit plus $10,000 for the wood frames and bases.
“(It’s) because we’re not government (and) regulated like (with) every red tape thing right now,” Mathieson said.
The new building will make A & L more visible to the public because few people knew it was downtown, aside from residents who visited the second floor for doctor’s appointments, he added. The academy is also now in a much safer location.
For more information, visit www.alroyaleducation.com.
