St. Marcellinus Secondary School


St. Marcellinus Secondary School is a Catholic high school located in Mississauga, Ontario. The school is ranked #22 in Ontario for academics, making it the highest ranked Catholic Secondary School in Mississauga for academics. St. Marcellinus Secondary School has quickly become a dominant force in high school athletics. Sports such as football, hockey, Cross-Country, and track and field have been dominated year after year by students from this school. Their rival schools include Our Lady of Mount Carmel, St. Aloysius Gonzaga, St. Francis Xavier and Lorne Park. The founding principal of St. Marcellinus, John McAllister, was succeeded by Thomas Wisnicki, Frank Furgiuele, and Annibale Iarossi.

History

The construction of St. Marcellinus was necessary to decrease overpopulation at St. Joseph Secondary School and St. Francis Xavier Secondary School by providing teens living in the newly developed Meadowvale Village area an easily accessible secondary school. John McAllister was hired as the founding principal of the school, along with only 12 original teachers and 3 secretaries. The school opened with 143 grade 9 students in a temporary location in Streetsville during its formation. The school shared this facility with John Cabot Catholic Secondary School and St. Edmund Campion Secondary School. In September 2004, the school moved to its new permanent facility at Mavis Road and Courtneypark Drive West. The state of the art institution is part of a shared facility agreement with the City of Mississauga. The campus includes the second largest library in the City of Mississauga and a track and field complex that boasts a $1,000,000 artificial field and an 8 lane all weather track. St. Marcellinus Secondary School is well known for academic excellence and athletic expertise with a wide variety of clubs and arts activities. The school motto is “Let Every Spirit Soar.” In 2013, the St.Marcellinus Improv Team won first place in the Canadian Improv Games, the first team from Mississauga ever to win the National title.
There is very limited information on St. Marcellinus himself. However, he was held in great veneration in Rome. Pope St. Damasus says that “he heard the story of this martyr from his executioner, Dorotheus, who became a Christian after his death.” Marcellinus was a priest who was arrested after Diocletian announced his edict against Christian clergy. The Roman saw his sentence as a chance to evangelize and converted his guard, wife, and daughter. The guard and his family were then crushed to death. Marcellinus was then led to a forest and told to clear brambles from the place of his execution. They were beheaded secretly so that his body wouldn't be recognized. The slayer, however, revealed the location of the body to two Christian women who buried him. His name appears in the first Eucharistic prayer and Constantine built a basilica over his tomb.

Feeder Schools

The Courtneypark Library serves as both a community library with resources and programs geared to the everyday requirements of all ages of users, and a school library for the school. This library is a shared facility between the City of Mississauga and the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board..

Specialist High Skills Major (SHSM)

St. Marcellinus Secondary School offers a Specialist High Skills Major program in Hospitality & Tourism and Arts & Culture. Students can earn credits and receive a certificate in Hospitality when they graduate.
The SHSM is a ministry-approved specialized program that allows students to focus their learning on a specific economic sector while meeting the requirements for the Ontario Secondary School Diploma and assists in their transition from secondary school to apprenticeship training, college, university, or the workplace.
An SHSM enables students to gain sector-specific skills and knowledge in the context of engaging, career-related learning environments and helps them focus on graduation and on pursuing their post secondary goals.

Uniform

Like many Catholic Secondary Schools in Dufferin Peel's Catholic District School Board, St. Marcellinus has a uniform policy. Originally, the uniform consisted of a unisex white polo, a unisex red sweater, a unisex vest, long black pants for males and females, and a plaid skirt for females. As of September 2012, the plaid skirts were banned. The uniform has been continuously updated since the school's inception in 2003 and newer variations of sweaters, pants, and polo shirts have been recently introduced.

Lab Explosion

In March of 2010, a routine chemistry experiment at St. Marcellinus exploded into flames when a Bunsen burner ignited a beaker full of methanol. The incident sent five students to the hospital and left one student critically injured. Lab safety experts determined that the incident could have been prevented with better safety equipment.

Promposals

St. Marcellinus has become well known on the internet for being the host of extravagant and creative proposals, with many flash-mob styles promposal videos hosted in the school's cafetorium gaining thousands of views on YouTube since the school's inception. The most well known video to date is a flash mob to One Direction's "What Makes You Beautiful", and currently has over 280,000 views on YouTube.

Notable alumni