Enriching De La Salle’s sporting heritage with our new 3G Outdoor Pitch
De La Salle College, Jersey, celebrated the completion of a 3G Astro Pitch which has enriched the already extensive sporting facilities at the school, as outlined below.
De La Salle College in Jersey is part of the international community of Lasallian schools. We offer an inclusive education from ages 3 to 18. From our vantage point on Wellington Hill with views across St Helier, the school site boasts an excellent range of academic, sporting, recreation and creative art facilities and a reputation for outstanding pastoral care. Our academic outcomes at GCSE and in the sixth form are testimony to a learning environment where students of all abilities can thrive.
Extensive Sporting Facilities
De La Salle’s grounds comprise a deceptively extensive range of facilities. We certainly encourage all prospective parents to tour the College campus, and to see our day-to-day classes in action. We have an wide range of on-site indoor facilities comprising; a modern Sports Hall; 3G Astro Pitch; College Gymnasium; and a Fitness Suite. Our fleet of coaches parked opposite Beeches House in front of the main College Reception provide access to the outstanding facilities across the Island to support our afternoon Double-Games lessons and Swimming tuition.
Welcoming our new, multi-purpose 3G Astro Pitch
During the summer break, a three-month project has been completed to create an outdoor 3G Astro pitch as part of the College site. Just a two-minute walk from the College campus, the 3G pitch represents a fantastic addition to our on-site facilities.
Overseeing this project was Tony Dubras, Director of Architectural Design AD Limited, a former student of De La Salle Jersey whose father also attended the College and whose three children are currently in our care. Indeed, the Dubras family’s relationship with the College can be traced all the way back to its opening in 1917 with Tony’s great uncle attending amongst the very first students at the school.
Tony explains that the pitch represents “the very latest technology in carpet surfacing which incorporates sand rather than rubber pellets and additional matting”. The pitch is “hard-wearing and laid upon a sub-base of reconstituted stone with land drains ensuring no flooding risk and a surface which is both all-weather and all-purpose .” As a consequence, students have no need to wear Astro-boots and can use the pitch with traditional football boots.
The work was completed through a partnership between A A Langlois Recycling Limited and Nigel McClinton of Pitch and Track Jersey Limited. Nigel oversaw Health and Safety while liaising with the parent company, ‘Pitch and Track’ in the UK and coordinating transportation and fitting of the 3G carpet. Currently, Newcastle United’s football pitch, St James’ Park, is the only other location in the UK to currently enjoy this brand new and technologically advanced 3G surfacing.
While the 3G pitch is already in use and providing an excellent facility for our Primary Games lessons, we look forward to hosting an event in the spring to showcase some of our excellent young footballing talents and to formally open our newest addition to the College site.
Our young Lasallian sportsmen will certainly be reaping the benefits over years to come!
Extra-Curricular and Sport Enrichment Opportunities
Sport and exercise have an important role to play in our students’ health, learning and well-being. This is recognised at De La Salle in many ways. Students at Key Stage 3, for example, enjoy four lessons of sport each week. We offer Sport Science as a GCSE qualification and at sixth form level, and our students compete across sporting disciplines including team sports such as cricket, football and rugby and a wide variety of individual sports, on a local level and against national and international schools. Our competitive teams have opportunities to tour together, with trips partly subsidised through the wonderful efforts of our student body in the famous De La Salle Island Walk.
Across the Primary and Secondary schools, we work in close partnership with a number of external clubs and provisions, including Jersey Farmers, Brazilian Soccer School, Jersey Cricket Board, Jersey Reds, Sport Jersey, to name but a few! A number of our students perform at Island and National levels, and our Sporting Wall of Fame in the John Sankey Building showcases many of our outstanding young sportsmen, ranging from Commonwealth Games swimmers and athletes, to British Touring Car racers and internationally-capped rugby players. Many of our old boys will be interested to know that Luc Langlois is proudly featured on the Wall of Fame having achieved the fastest Island Walk time of 4 hours and 27 minutes in April 2022!
Our extra-curricular programme has recently been further expanded to include a wealth of sporting and enrichment opportunities. Our general school enrichment programme provides clubs covering Italian, choir, group music performance, board games, drama, DJ and mixing, movies, faith exploration, Lego construction, to name but a few. Our sporting venues across the school, which of course includes the new 3G Astro pitch, host a plethora of opportunities such as trampolining, basketball, table tennis, badminton, martial arts, cricket development, and fitness training.
We believe there is something for everyone in our care.
Citation to be included:
“De La Salle provides a unique Christian education within a caring and nurturing environment. Our long-term focus on well-being and values produces excellent role models equipped to achieve their ambitions.”
Contact details
If you wish to find out more about De La Salle, or to arrange a tour, please contact Mrs Emma Gascoyne by telephoning 754114 or by emailing admissionspa@dls-jersey.co.uk
