Church College of New Zealand is a private
secondary schoolSecondary school is a term used to describe an educational institution where the final stage of compulsory schooling, known as secondary education, takes place. It follows on from elementary or primary education....
in
HamiltonHamilton is the centre of New Zealand's fourth largest urban area, and Hamilton City is the country's seventh largest territorial authority. Hamilton is in the Waikato region of the North Island, approximately south of Auckland...
,
New ZealandNew Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses , and numerous smaller islands, most notably Stewart Island/Rakiura and the Chatham Islands. The indigenous Māori named New Zealand Aotearoa, commonly translated as The Land of the Long White Cloud...
, that is operated by the
Church Educational SystemThe Church Educational System of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints consists of several institutions that provide religious and secular education for both Latter-day Saint and non-Latter-day Saint elementary, secondary, and post-secondary students and adult learners...
of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). It has been scheduled to be closed in 2009.
Construction of the Church College of New Zealand began in 1952. In 1955 the LDS Church announced that it would construct a
templeIn The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also called the LDS or Mormon Church, a temple is a building dedicated to be a House of the Lord, and they are considered by Church members to be the most sacred structures on earth. Upon completion, temples are usually open to the public for a...
in Hamilton. The president of the LDS Church at the time was
David O. McKayDavid Oman McKay was the ninth president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints , serving from 1951 until his death...
, and he initially went to New Zealand to downsize the whole building programme.
Church College of New Zealand is a private
secondary schoolSecondary school is a term used to describe an educational institution where the final stage of compulsory schooling, known as secondary education, takes place. It follows on from elementary or primary education....
in
HamiltonHamilton is the centre of New Zealand's fourth largest urban area, and Hamilton City is the country's seventh largest territorial authority. Hamilton is in the Waikato region of the North Island, approximately south of Auckland...
,
New ZealandNew Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses , and numerous smaller islands, most notably Stewart Island/Rakiura and the Chatham Islands. The indigenous Māori named New Zealand Aotearoa, commonly translated as The Land of the Long White Cloud...
, that is operated by the
Church Educational SystemThe Church Educational System of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints consists of several institutions that provide religious and secular education for both Latter-day Saint and non-Latter-day Saint elementary, secondary, and post-secondary students and adult learners...
of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). It has been scheduled to be closed in 2009.
History
Construction of the Church College of New Zealand began in 1952. In 1955 the LDS Church announced that it would construct a
templeIn The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also called the LDS or Mormon Church, a temple is a building dedicated to be a House of the Lord, and they are considered by Church members to be the most sacred structures on earth. Upon completion, temples are usually open to the public for a...
in Hamilton. The president of the LDS Church at the time was
David O. McKayDavid Oman McKay was the ninth president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints , serving from 1951 until his death...
, and he initially went to New Zealand to downsize the whole building programme. After visiting the project, McKay was so impressed with what he saw and felt he decided to add two more buildings to the school construction, which today are called the David O. McKay Auditorium and the
Matthew CowleyMatthew Cowley was an American missionary and a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 1945 until his death...
Administration Building. Church College and the
Hamilton New Zealand TempleThe Hamilton New Zealand Temple is the 13th constructed and 11th operating temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints...
were built on the same 35
hectareA hectare is a unit of area equal to , or one square hectometre , and commonly used for measuring land area....
site in what later became
Temple ViewTemple View is a suburb of the city of Hamilton, New Zealand. Temple View was established in the 1950s out of the construction of the Hamilton New Zealand Temple and the Church College of New Zealand by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints...
, a suburb of Hamilton. Both facilities were built entirely by volunteer labour missionaries of the LDS Church. Church College was dedicated and formally opened on 26 April 1958 by McKay. Clifton D. Boyack was the first principal of the school.
Construction
The foundations were laid for everything in Temple View in the early 1950s. Inspection for a property in Tuikaramea road began in 1950. The
mission presidentMission president is a priesthood leadership position in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints . A mission president is a man who presides over a mission and the missionaries serving in the mission...
Gordon Young drove out to the area, and knew immediately that that was the place where the LDS Church was to build a school and temple. Church officials from
UtahUtah is a western state of the United States. It was the 45th state admitted to the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80 percent of Utah's 2,736,424 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering around Salt Lake City. In contrast, vast expanses of the state are nearly uninhabited, making...
came and bought the property, and members of the church from all over New Zealand slowly moved into the area to work as labour missionaries on the project.
Before any work commenced on the school, the surrounding property was developed. The temple foundations were laid, the accommodations for the people who came to work were built, and a social infrastructure was established. Initially, there were only a few people at the site. Much of the surrounding land was
peatPeat is an accumulation of partially decayed vegetation matter. Peat forms in wetlandbogs, moors, muskegs, pocosins, mires, and peat swamp forests...
, and it took some ingenuity to make the land agriculturaly productive.
Many of the existing buildings were used as temporary quarters for those participating in construction and administration. Cottages were built to house the building missionaries when they arrived. Dormitory-type accommodations were provided for the single men. Food was sent in from the church members in other parts of the country, and some of it was grown locally.
A stream ran across the property behind the men's accommodation and behind their eating house. In the winters it always flooded so the men's accommodation and some of the cottages were usually semi-submerged in water at the time. A young child drowned in the stream so for safety concrete piping was brought in for protection, and to seal the steam.
The concrete bricks for the school buildings were manufactured locally by a special crew of building missionaries. There were specialist plumbing, electrical(sparkies), painting, welding, mechanic and other crews for the construction of the many facilities. Supervisors for these crews were called from the U.S. They came with their families, and helped greatly with the overall communal life of the building missionaries. The building missionaries were exposed to the way the LDS Church did things in the U.S., and this helped facilitate the transition of the LDS Church in New Zealand from its
missionA mission of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a geographical administrative area to which church missionaries are assigned. Almost all areas of the world are within the boundaries of an LDS Church mission, whether or not Mormon missionaries live or proselytize in the area.-...
status to the stake and ward system.
Enrollment
The school teaches students in New Zealand's educational years nine through thirteen (13- to 18-year olds). There are approximately 700 students and 100 staff members. A modest tuition is charged but the school is heavily subsidized by the LDS Church. Approximately 10% of
Latter Day SaintA Latter Day Saint is an adherent of the Latter Day Saint movement, a group of denominations tracing their heritage to the teachings of Joseph Smith, Jr. and the Church of Christ he organized in 1830...
high school students in New Zealand attend Church College, with some attending the school away from home as a
boarding schoolA boarding school is a school where some or all pupils not only study, but also live during term time, with their fellow students and possibly teachers. The word 'boarding' is used in the sense of "bed and board", that is, food and lodging...
.
Closure
On 2006-06-29, LDS Church leaders announced that the Church College of New Zealand would cease accepting new students in 2007 and would close at the end of the 2009 school year; in discussing its decision, the church cited a policy of the church to close its private secondary schools when the public school system is able to offer "quality education".