Waterford Place Learning Resource Centre

The building of our Learning Resource Centre was the first phase of the College Master Plan which commenced four years ago with a vision to undertake an innovative project to meet the current and future educational needs of the students of Ignatius Park College. This project had three elements: firstly, the demolition of the Brothers House, which was located on this very site with some fifty-two Christian Brothers residing in the Brothers House for over fifty years from 1969 - 2019. The second element was the expansion of our car park, not only increasing our staff car parks, including a disability and visitors car park and a safe drop off and pick up areas for our students.

The final element and the highlight of this project was our Waterford Place Learning Resource Centre. Our Learning Resource Centre is named after the city of Waterford, Ireland, as it was in this place over 200 years ago that Blessed Edmund Rice responded to the call to develop the first Christian Brothers school. Schools that provided the young men of Waterford a life-changing, liberating and hope-filled education relevant for their time in history. In Denis McLaughlin’s book “The Price of Freedom: Edmund Rice Educational Leader”, he stated: It was the sight of poor boys along the quays of Waterford which inspired Edmund Rice to commence his system of education. This was a Ricean education that was reflected in his original schools in Waterford, both in New Street and Mt. Sion. An education that was radical for its time in developing the whole child, ensuring his schools were a place of respect, education for liberation and a place where students feel safe. It is these virtues that we wanted to emulate in this new Learning Resource Centre.

Waterford Place, through its innovative and inclusive design, invites us as an educational community to respond, like Edmund Rice, to a new call-in education. This call meets the diverse learning needs of our young men within a contemporary context. Promoting through its design an education that is hope-filled and liberates the hearts, minds, and souls of our young people to meet the challenges of the world in which they live. A world characterised by globalisation, rapid technological advancement, and significant environmental and humanitarian challenges.

Waterford Place, through its design and displays, grounds our young men’s educational journey in the story of our First Nations People, our rich history and tradition, while all the time calling them in their role as stewards of creation and leaders of tomorrow. Our Learning Resource Centre, through its design, is a learning experience.

The development of this learning resource centre was the collaboration of many people who had the dream and vision not to construct another conventional library but an innovative, contemporary and dynamic space that allows both teachers and students to thrive in an all-inclusive environment, which empowers individuals to flourish in a supportive space.

The College would like to thank both EREA and our Advisory Council, who supported this project from its inception, and the voice of our design students, who developed concept plans in the early stages to ensure that it would be communal in its design with a café, an outside deck and a large fish tank.  Thank you to Dillon Architects and Carol Dowd, our Project Manager, who all took our dream of a modern learning centre and made it a reality.

Our Waterford Place Learning Resource Centre wouldn’t be standing today without W&F Constructions, Josh, Steven and most importantly, Trent, our onsite Supervisor, who all ensured the centre was constructed on time and within budget.  The multiple subcontractors with whom we had to create a space filled with modern technology, creative furnishing, lush landscaping and Aboriginal heritage. Thank you: NQ AV, BFX Furniture, Norther Land Design and Robbie Paul Designs.

 It is the hope that Waterford Place Learning Resource Centre extends to all those who enter, through its cultural and environmental sensitivity, digital technology and innovative learning spaces, to engage in inquiry, to seek new meaning and understanding, to be solutions driven and hope-filled for the world in which we live.

For all our students who use this wonderful facility, it is the vision, like Blessed Edmund Rice, that the learning journey is enlightened by faith, animated by love, justice and peace and leading to a sense of expansive hope for creation and humanity. 

 Waterford Place Learning Resource Centre Ignatius Park College was established in 2023.