Large room: Life at the Academy
Grand Coteau is a rural town and travel to larger cities was long and difficult. Because of this and the cloister of the Sisters, many tasks were performed on site. Novices printed and bound books and the Sisters made and cut their own hosts for Mass.
A number of the bricks used to build the main building were made on site using clay dug from a pit on the grounds.
School books, prayer books, ribbons, and prize medals were awarded to students at regular assemblies.
The Religious would eat together in the refectory. There was a long table where the superior and more senior Sisters ate and a number of other long bench tables where the other members of the community sat for meals.
During community recreation time, the Sisters would have congregated in a circle mending or doing needlework while the Superior read letters or shared news.
As most students were boarders, they came together in the evenings to study. They would have been presided over by one of the Religious seated on an elevated platform.
When the Religious of the Sacred Heart operated the parish school as well as the African American school in Grand Coteau, they traveled to and from the convent with their lunch in these containers.