New Toronto Secondary School was originally established on September 4, 1951 by the New Toronto Board of Education to serve the town of New Toronto and emphasized the technical trades, sciences, and mathematics, to support the many industries in the town at the time. The school's roots go back to 1926 when Long Branch Continuation School was established as an extension of an elementary school with six classrooms. The vocational program began in 1950 and students moved to the new high school the following year.
Another school in the area, Alderwood Collegiate Institute was also opened on September 6, 1955, with the official opening ceremony November 1955 as an academic high school.
During the 1980s, enrollment at Etobicoke public schools plummeted as many catholic transferred their children to the Catholic school system when full funding commenced. This led to the closure of many schools including Alderwood Collegiate Institute, Royal York Collegiate Institute and Mimico High School. The students of those schools were consolidated with the students of New Toronto into the newly named Lakeshore Collegiate Institute which opened on September 6, 1983.
Overview
Lakeshore's new field
Sports
LCI has had several sports teams including: ice hockey, baseball, badminton, volleyball, golf, tennis, and soccer. The football team was resurrected in the fall of 2005 after many years of absence. The hockey team won the TDSSAA West Championships and qualified for OFSSAA in 2004 (Peterborough), 2006 (Timmons) and 2009 (Peterborough). The baseball team won the TDSSAA West Championships in 2006. The soccer team also won the TDSSAA West Region championship for the second time in Lakeshore CI's history in 2008. The first soccer championship occurred in 1986 when the junior boys' soccer seam won the Etobicoke championship vs Martingrove Collegiate played at ECI in a shootout. They also went on to win the TDSSAA Championship again via penalty shoot-out at Eglinton Flats.[citation needed]
Other extracurricular activities
Lakeshore Collegiate offers a range of extracurricular programs. Among these are the Student Activity Council (or SAC), Leadership, Dance Club, Drama club, The Announcements Committee, The Yearbook Committee, sports teams, and various groups that compete in mathematics and science competitions.
One of Lakeshore Collegiate's highlights is its Drama Department. Headed by Gregory Danakas, the Drama department offers courses for grades nine through twelve. LCI has an annual stage production in which students are selected via audition. Past stage productions have featured performances of Bram Stoker's Dracula, William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew, Euripides' The Bacchae, Ann-Marie MacDonald's Good Night Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet), Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist, Edmond Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac, and John Kirkpatrick's Vacancy in Paradise. Drama at LCI offers other extracurricular opportunities, such as the Play By the Lake/Sears Drama Festival, where student directed, student acted, and often student written plays are performed, as well as the Young Company, which offers Grade 9 and 10 students the chance to perform and star in a major play before they can be a part of the Mainstage Production. As of March 9, 2007, Lakeshore has won the Best Host School Award for its district.
In recent years, the LCI music department put on concerts both for the student body and for the public.[citation needed]
