The impending closure of the only LDS Church-owned high school in New Zealand will mark the end of a rich history.
The campus in Hamilton, a thriving city on the northern island of New Zealand, has a mix of boarding and day students. Over the years the school received admission applications from all parts of the country, plus other Pacific islands, Europe and Asia. Philip Hague, a spokesperson in New Zealand for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, said more than 90 percent of the student body is ethnically Maori, the indigenous people of New Zealand. Maori language has been taught as a subject since the school opened.
When the school was started many Mormon youths in New Zealand did not have access to secondary education. That is different today.
"Given the ready access that church members have to high-quality government schooling throughout New Zealand, there is no longer a need for the church to provide nonreligious education to its young members," Hague said in a press release. "We can now concentrate our efforts in other areas, such as the Pacific islands, where local communities can gain greater benefit from church assistance."
The Church College of New Zealand initially enrolled 13- to 18-year-olds. It began phasing out its student body by grade level, having 400 remaining youths.
"(Students in the ninth and 10th grades) have been phased out of CCNZ, transitioning smoothly into local schools (because CCNZ) has always followed the national curriculum," Hague said. This has led to the release of some teachers and staff who were given an opportunity to take courses that would assist them in seeking further employment.
The school was built by labor missionaries who served and lived in a camp now called Temple View, a suburb of Hamilton. The living conditions were as challenging as the physical labor.
Walking planks, sunk in thick mud, lined one-room huts, housing families as big as six. The young men's barracks looked like chicken coops with wire mesh for windows. Trucks pulled up at all hours of the night, and the young men left their beds to unload timber and cement bags. Then the men showered and headed back to barracks to catch some sleep before their 12-hour shifts started at 6 a.m.
The campus ground has an equally rich history as those who worked on it — labor missionaries and contract workers from other faiths.
Gordon C. Young, a former mission president in New Zealand and great-great-grandson of Brigham Young, was scouting the country to purchase land for the school. According to his oral history, he came across a sprawling farm, seeing in vision Church College of New Zealand and the adjoining temple.
In April 1958, church President David O. McKay dedicated the school and the Hamilton New Zealand Temple that stand astride the bucolic land Young had envisioned.
During the school's dedicatory service, President McKay said the school's mandate was to first carve out character in the students, with academics being a close second.
The last crop of students is no different. Hague, a teacher at the school, has observed that the students, faculty and staff have exhibited "a happy and upbeat spirit," all motivated to complete the academic year in November with high results both in their spiritual and secular subjects.
"(The church) will establish an appropriate commemorative monument," Hague said. "There are practical steps (being taken) to actually ensure that there is a visible and tangible memory of CCNZ."