Hamilton Rotoroa and Hamilton West School

The school in Hamilton showed in the right middle of the photo above. It is called Hamilton West School, and this building built on the hill along Victoria Street during the earliest European Settlement in Hamilton – 1864.

Two Redoubts in Hamilton between the Waikato River

Then around the 1870s, the Hamilton West building shifted to the site where WINTEC is currently today. Before the World Wars Two, the school building shifted to the final spot opposite the Lake Rotoroa. During the Second War, it used as a military hospital.

When and why does the Deaf Unit fit in this school?

The Ministry of Education Board staff asked several school inspectors to look at many schools around central North Island. The principal of Kelston School for the Deaf (now called Kelston Deaf Education) request to the Ministry of Education due to a high population of D/deaf children and the parents of the D/deaf children want their children to be near their homes. One of the school inspectors happened to have a Deaf son, and they were living in Wellington after living in the Pacific Islands. Mr Wilson was the name as a school inspector, and he collaborated with Mr Dion (Darcy) Dale – the principal and the staff of Kelson School for the Deaf, Mr Gubb – the Presbyterian minister of Hamilton East and the Minister of Education when they believed to find a comprehensive school for the parents of the D/deaf children. It was Hamilton West School.

The Deaf Unit established in late 1961 at Hamilton West and several D/deaf children enrolled at the Hamilton West in 1962. The first classroom was a cloakroom until the proper classroom established with full pieces of equipment and resources for the teacher of the D/deaf children and D/deaf children. The teachers of Hamilton West School had a limit of experience working with the D/deaf children until the teacher of the Deaf move to Hamilton from any other school of the D/deaf. The teacher in the photo below was Mrs J Havery. The teacher of the D/deaf children moved to Hamilton West School from Kelston School for the Deaf and to live in Hamilton. They were Miss R Bradnam and Miss K Deare. There was a limit of funding by the Ministry of Education from the start, and the parents of the D/deaf children made resources like jigsaw puzzles, blackboard stand, picture with English sentences books. Yes, the parents of the D/deaf children made the materials of equipment and teaching books and games with their incomes.

At Hamilton West School there was a special needs classroom in the late 1950s, and there was a small number of children with disabilities including one Deaf girl who later moved to Kelston School for the Deaf before 1960. The Deaf Unit grew from one to three classrooms from 1973 due to the high population of D/deaf children who got rubella and meningitis between 1961 and 1969.

Today there is no Deaf unit at Hamilton West School because there has been declining in the number of D/deaf children transitioned to Kelson Deaf Education Centre and the mainstream schools.