St. Joachim begins new era
The Second World War will finally end at St. Joachim Parish School
this September.
For the last two years, the Costa Mesa church and private school
has been engaged in the process of demolishing its aging buildings
and replacing them with state-of-the-art facilities. Among the
structures that came down last year were buildings that had served as
barracks at the Santa Ana military base in the 1940s.
When students return for class on Sept. 8, they will find more
than 30,000 square feet of new facilities: a two-story classroom and
office building and the school’s first-ever gymnasium, both of which
are in the final stages of construction.
“It’s fabulous,” said Martha Harper, a St. Joachim parent who
donated to the school’s fundraising campaign. “We’re really looking
forward to the new school year. There’s so much space. It’s beyond my
expectations.”
St. Joachim, a private Catholic school, has classes from
pre-kindergarten through eighth grade. In recent months, classrooms
and the library have been located in temporary buildings around the
small campus.
Nearly a decade ago, the parish began making plans for renovation.
The parish was constructed in 1946 and the school in 1949, with an
additional school building added in the early 1960s. The original
church, long since demolished, also originally was part of the
military base.
The total estimated cost for the construction was $7.5 million,
and the parish has raised nearly that amount. John Stoneman, the
fundraising coordinator for St. Joachim, said the project needed
approximately $800,000 for completion.
The first $4 million for the St. Joachim renovations came from
the John and Dorothy Shea Foundation, which offers grants to Catholic
schools nationwide. The school also raised funds from its own
parishioners and from other donors in the community. Stoneman said
some of the parishioners have made additional pledges to donate money
totaling more than $2 million, and that the Diocese of Orange offered
to loan the school $1 million to pay for the last of the work.
“I don’t think there’s any question that we’ll have to use part of
that $1 million loan,” Stoneman noted. “Obviously, the pledges aren’t
going to come in quickly enough to finish the project. I’d like to
not to have to use all of it.”
The construction work itself is nearly finished. In renovating the
grounds, crews retained only the building from the 1960s, although
they retrofitted it for earthquake safety.
New at the school next month will be science laboratories, a music
appreciation room, a computer area, a larger library and classrooms,
and the new gym, which will also double as a multipurpose room for
the church.
“We’re going to have a beautiful facility from the standpoint of
teaching,” Stoneman said.
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