by Jennifer Pritchett
Northern News Services

NNSL (June 04/97) - The Catholic school board is going ahead with plans to retrofit Weledeh school after a $6.3-million project was approved by the GNWT last week.

The three-phase, four-year construction project will use the existing Weledeh structure and the gymnasium of the old St. Pat's high school.

The rest of the old high school will be torn down and a new middle school for grades 6 to 8 will be constructed on the property between Weledeh and St. Patrick high school.

The initial phase includes the planning of the project and the transitional area for the middle school. The second phase will take care of retrofitting the existing structure. The third phase will see the remodelling of the old gym and the construction of a link from Weledeh to the gym.

"Our hope would be that we could gut as much as possible and start from inside the school," said Don Kindt, assistant superintendent of the Catholic board.

"Eventually the portables will be all gone and the board offices will all be gone."

The board has received $360,000 for the planning stage of the project, which is expected to run until February 1998.

This funding will be followed by $2 million annually for three years.

Kindt said that the board is looking at arranging the site as a campus instead of three distinct schools -- Weledeh, St. Pat's and the new middle school.

With this change, the student capacity of the site will increase to 1,005 from the present enrolment of 880.