Saint Anthony's Canossian Secondary School 3.98

St. Anthony's Canossian Secondary School (SACSS) is a girls' secondary school located in Bedok, Singapore. It is part of the Canossian (Canossian Daughters of Charity, FDCC) family of Catholic girls' schools in Singapore.Relative to the long history of music and visual arts in the Singapore schools' instructional curriculum, dance and drama programmes have been relatively recent additions to the core curricula at select secondary schools. By integrating the two dynamic performing arts programmes into the existing music and visual arts curricula at SACSS, the school has been able to widen students' appreciation of arts as well as cater to the unique needs of students with different artistic talents through the expanded range of programmes. In 2002, the school received recognition for its niche in performing arts education.HistoryIn August 1879, Fr Jose Pedro Santa Anna de Cunha of St Joseph's Church started a school for poor parishioners. As a result, the St. Anna's School with an enrolment of six students opened in Middle Road. In 1886, the school became known as St. Anthony's Boys' & Girls' School. The boys' and girls' school split 15 years later. The first four Canossian sisters arrived to run the Portuguese Mission school, and there the poor and neglected found refuge. The younger girls attended school while the older ones learned sewing and embroidery. The 1900s marked the beginning of a new era for the school. St. Anthony's Girls' School was renamed St. Anthony's Convent in 1906. Subsequently, a new chapel, quarters for the nuns, a kindergarten and first Junior Cambridge class (equivalent to Secondary 3 or 4) were added.The school buildings survived the war and Japanese Occupation. The Japanese military police took over the school and the sisters were placed under house arrest. When the war ended, the buildings were used to house war orphans. In 1952, the wooden convent was demolished and a 5-storey building was constructed in its place. The following year, the new school was officially opened.