École Sainte-Anne

École Sainte-Anne or E.S.A. is an entirely French-language grades 6–12 school in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada. The school is located in the Centre Communautaire Sainte-Anne. In the late 1950s, a group called Cercle Français was created by the young French families that were arriving in the Fredericton area to work for the government. This group began asking the English school district to open French classes at one of the schools in the area when they realised they were in need of a place to send their children to receive an education. After having their idea rejected multiple times, the French group decided to embark on a new adventure and try to open their own French public school. In 1965, they opened École bilingue primaire de Fredericton, which later became École Sainte-Anne, in an old Knights of Columbus building. The school began with 22 students in first and second grade. In a community that was mostly English, it was not easier for the students and their professors. On a daily basis, members of the English community would scream insults at them when they would enter and exit the building. After a few more years of arguing with the English school district, the French community final got an official public school thanks to the New Brunswick premier at the time, Louis J. Robichaud. That same year, the school then moved to a condemned military barrack from World War II and obtained a total of 72 students. In 1971, the school moved once more to the building that is now known as the Montgomery Street School with a total of 171 students. Due to the lack of space for the students and the absence of collaboration from the part of Counsel 26, the French community created a committee called le Comité de l'avenir du Cercle français in 1972 and the students had to finish high school, so 10th to 12th grade, at Fredericton High School. On January 15, 1973, this new committee submitted a proposal to the premier, Richard Hatfield, to create a French community center that would also act as a school.