Mount de Sales Academy (Georgia) - Modernization and Expansion

Modernization and Expansion

Mount de Sales discontinued its primary school in 1936, but continued to serve as a girls' secondary school for both boarding and day students until 1959 when the first boys were admitted as day students, and the girls' boarding school closed in 1963. The school's movement toward becoming a coeducational facility was at the request of the Bishop of Savannah, and the first coeducational graduating class included 16 boys of 46 total graduates in 1963. The fall of 1963 also marked the racial integration of Mount de Sales, making it the first school in Middle Georgia to do so.

The admission of boys and the racial integration of the school was the culmination of the expansion and modernization of the school that began in the 1950s. In addition to the already existing Cavalier Hall, newly constructed buildings on the campus included St. Joseph's Hall, McAuley Hall, Burke Hall, Mercy Hall, and De Sales Hall. In 1970, the original convent and boarding school building was demolished after the Sisters moved to a new convent building that had been erected on College Street. Mount de Sales' expansion and modernization continued at a steady pace throughout the last quarter of the 20th century. In 1975, the middle school was reinstated with the re-addition of an eighth grade to the school. A seventh grade was re-added in 1988, and in 2004 a sixth grade was added, though membership for this class is split between Mount de Sales and the nearby elementary school, St. Joseph Catholic School.