St. Ignatius El Bosque

History

In 1931 the Society of Jesus acquired ten blocks of land in the Providencia district, intending to build a stadium for the already existent St. Ignatius Alonso Ovalle School (that was located in downtown Santiago). During the construction of the stadium, the idea of building a modern boarding school came out. On 8 December 1935 they put the first “brick” of the new boarding school with authorities participation. In 1936 the stadium was opened.

The Lecaros Building (boarding school) was on the final stage of construction when the boarding school project was canceled by St. Ignatius Alonso Ovalle School in 1954.

Due to the advanced construction, the idea of taking the preparatory courses to the new building was purposed.

On the Centenary year of the original school, on 3 October 1956, they open the new “Pocuro Building”. Later the secondary school became St. Ignatius El Bosque School

At that moment already 400 students of primary school were using the new building in charge of Hermanas del Amor Misericordioso.

During 1960 the provincial Church decides to completely separate the two campuses in totally different schools, meanwhile, the school keeps growing so a new building is under construction. At first, the name of the new campus was supposed to be “ St. Luis Gonzaga School” but due to legal problems and the already stable reputation of the old name they kept using it but changing the name of the streets were they are located. The same year, a lot of students of downtown moved to the new campus.

In 1964 the Prefect father José Francisco Arrau decided to build a cafeteria and end the track field

During the late 1990 and early 2000, the original school project was complete after building the Gym, and the 11th and 12th graders building.

On 2014 and 2017 two new buildings were done, the first one being the art pavilion with modern architecture, and the second, the new kindergarten building continuing with the original architecture of the school

In 2018 minor fixing and constructions were made on the Lecaros Building, adding an elevator and a new stair system.

Administration

Since the separation of both schools, St. Ignatius El Bosque School was directed by only Jesuits priests until 2016 when Fr. Ismael Aracena S.J. left. The principal, director, and rector is Jorge Radich Hernici, a lay person and alumnus.

Notable alumni

Rafael Araneda

Joaquín Barañao

Benito Baranda

Juan Barros Madrid

Felipe Berríos

Jorge Burgos

Felipe Camiroaga

Gonzalo Cornejo

Sergio Espejo

Gonzalo García Pino

Francisco López Amenábar

Alfredo Moreno Charme

Felipe Seymour

Raimundo Tupper

Francisco Undurraga

Alberto Undurraga

José Miguel Viñuela

Antonio Walker

Keko Yunge