Jeff Colbourne
Northern News Services

NNSL (May 15/98) - It many very well become a super gym.

One of the highlights being proposed for the Weledeh Catholic school upgrade and retrofit is a new gymnasium joined to the three-year-old St. Patrick high school gymnasium.

"What we're trying to do is that we want to have an operable wall between the two gyms so that it can be opened up," said Don Kindt, assistant superintendent for instruction with the Catholic School Board.

"We can do conferences, trade shows, especially with the two diamond mines coming on," said Loretta Foley, board superintendent.

The new gym could be a minimum of 527 square metres of floor space, said Kindt. The government standard for an elementary school is 396 square metres.

A larger-capacity gym being considered for Weledeh would have a floor space of 775 square metres plus allocations for school storage, community storage, additional change rooms and showers.

The larger gym would have a bigger roof span, with nine-metre ceiling instead of the normal 6.5 metres.

The gym could be used for a variety of events like basketball, volleyball, indoor running track, conventions, music performances, festivals and trade shows.

"It would develop as a real drawing card for the North if we could have the gyms with the retractable wall because we don't have anything of that capacity. We will have two great gyms for both of our schools and the community," said Annalise Van Ham, assistant superintendent of business with the board.

St. Pat is used seven days and seven nights, added Foley. Weledeh could easily become like St. Pat's.

The dual gyms when opened up could hold 3,960 for standing room only, 1,665 with fixed seats and tables and 2,100 in non-fixed seats.

Board consultants have said that the difference between what the school could afford to build and what the gym could be is an extra $1.4 million.