Avonside Girls' High School

Story

Avonside Girls' High School is a large urban high school in Christchurch, New Zealand, with more than 1200 girls from Year 9 to Year 13. It is situated in the suburb of Avonside but in 2018 will move, along with Shirley Boys' High School, to the former QEII Park site in the east of Christchurch.HistoryThe school originally opened in January 1919 on its current site as a satellite campus of Christchurch Girls' High School. It became a separate school in its own right in 1928.EarthquakeFollowing the 22 February 2011 Christchurch earthquake, the school site closed, with classes operating at Burnside High School in the afternoons. Two school blocks, including the Main Block, were condemned following the earthquake and were demolished.Students returned to the Avonside site at the beginning of 2012, with relocatable and prefabricated classrooms filling gaps left by the condemned buildings, but due to significant land damage adjacient to the school site, it was clear that the school might need to close or relocate. Education Minister Hekia Parata announced on 16 October 2013 that the school would move, and be co-located with Shirley Boys' High School at a new site in east Christchurch, and on 12 Feb 2015 the site was confirmed to be the former QEII Park site.Notable staffBefore she entered politics, Marian Hobbs was principal of the school. Jean Herbison, later New Zealand's first female chancellor of a New Zealand university, taught at the school from 1952 to 1959.