St Patrick’s College commenced as a boarding school for boys in 1893 and has catered for the educational, pastoral and co-curricular needs of boys from regional, remote and overseas communities for 125 years.
The College’s model for boarding, supported by first class facilities, facilitates positive learning outcomes for boys and builds upon the wonderful tradition which exists at the College.
At St Patrick’s College, boarders have the opportunity to live, study and play in one of Australia’s premier regional cities. Ballarat’s reputation for educational excellence is unsurpassed, being formally recognised as A ‘Learning City’.
St Patrick’s College has enthusiastically embraced this concept. We are confident that young men living in a close-knit and caring boarding community will develop the skills to make them life-long learners and leaders within the community.
St Patrick’s is committed to maintaining Boarding as an integral part of the school where students from around Australia and overseas can experience the challenges and rewards of living together within a supportive boarding community. Our Boarders are able to participate fully in the life of the College and develop friendships that last a lifetime.
With construction of an outstanding new boarding facility completed in 2018, St Patrick’s College offers a boarding environment and facilities unparalleled anywhere in regional Australia. Our boys live in purpose-designed rooms surrounded by first-class recreational, dining and study facilities. With a maximum of two boys per room, our accommodation is more akin to their own bedrooms at home, rather than a dormitory environment.
Resident staff provide expert care, support and guidance for our boarding students while also ensuring boys have access to all after-school activities including a structured study program.
Our boarding program offers extensive weekend activities as well as a growing social justice program which embeds our boarding students deep within the wider Ballarat community.
The Boarding Precinct is set in beautiful grounds in central Ballarat and form part of regional Australia’s foremost educational precinct.
Boarding students have supervised out-of-hours access to the College’s library, music rooms, indoor sports complex, weights training facility and Information Technology Laboratories.
Boys enjoy a busy, fun-filled life. It is indeed an idyllic place for young men to live, study and play!
St Patrick’s College has completed a major project to ensure the long-term future of boarding in first-class, custom-built facilities for generations to come.
We have brought all our boarders together in one designated precinct in the north-west corner of the College where they have access to brand new, ultra-modern, spacious, comfortable and, most importantly in Ballarat, warm facilities. They live as one community, not as three or four separate houses. They learn, dine, study, play, relax and grow together. They have wonderful new amenities, both indoor and outside and now form their own vibrant community once again.
We welcome boys from across Australia in numbers that haven’t been seen here for two decades.
Life as a boarder at St Patrick’s College is fun, challenging, engrossing, busy, structured and dynamic – all at the same time.
Boarding students are expected to adhere to and comply with relevant rules and regulations as a member of our community, but are also afforded significant time for personal activities.
Independence is encouraged, and so is working cohesively within a team.
Friendships made through boarding often extend into many decades later in life. Our experience of Old Collegians Association reunions indicates that it is the members of the boarding community who are more likely to forge life-long relationships due to the friendships founded at school. In this section of the website, using the links on the right hand side of this page, we endeavour to provide a thorough overview of what life is really like as a boarder at St Patrick’s College.
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