A two storey brick residence on approximately one acre of land, No.5 Dawson Street, was purchased for £1,000 for a day school.  It may have been the original intention for a day school to have been on the same site as the boarding school in Sturt Street but the distance and isolation of the Mary’s Mount site must almost immediately have made this impractical.

Loreto Dawson Street opened on 4^th November, 1875 just 4 months after the sisters had arrived from Ireland. Although nominally a day school there were usually 3 or 4 boarders recorded up until 1940.  The day school was for girls but also took boys up to grade 3.

The nuns travelled by horse drawn cab, the “convent cab”, provided by the Bishop, to Dawson Street from Mary’s Mount every morning to teach.  In the mornings before the children arrived the school had to be aired and dusted.  At the end of the day the two storeys had to be cleaned and prepared for the next day before the sisters returned to Mary’s Mount to take part in their community roles and duties for the boarders.

A community of sisters lived and worked at Dawson Street from 1882 until 1982.