Marian College

Marian College, Christchurch, was founded in 1982 by the merger of two Catholic secondary schools for girls, St. Mary's College (founded in Colombo Street in 1893 by the Sisters of Mercy) and McKillop College (named after Mary MacKillop (St. Mary of the Cross), located in Shirley (founded in 1949 by the Sisters of St. Joseph of the Sacred Heart). Both schools offered both residential and day programmes. The college is owned by the Catholic Bishop of Christchurch.  It was decided to combine these schools into a larger Catholic secondary day school for girls that would be an integrated school under the Private Schools Conditional Integration Act 1975, and to build it on the McKillop College campus in North Parade. Marian College was inaugurated on March 25, 1982, the feast of the Annunciation of the Lord. Sister Eleanor Capper, the first principal, retired in 1996. Marian College expanded its facilities during the next 30 years, adding an assembly hall/gymnasium, a music suite, a library, technology rooms, and new classrooms.The administration block was erected in 1914 by a Doctor Louisson and used as a family dwelling until it was sold to the Sisters of St Joseph in 1949.