It is dedicated to Saint Patrick of Ireland and St. Marguerite Bourgeoys, the founder of the Congregation of Notre Dame.

The motto for St. Patrick is "Amor Christi nos impellit" which translates to English as "The Love of Christ Impels Us".

The school opened as a result of students cannot be accommodated at Brother Edmund Rice, De La Salle, St. Mary's and St. Joseph College due to lack of space for portable classrooms.

[4] In 1989, during a period of reorganization by the Toronto Board of Education, Lakeview Secondary School, in a new building on the site of a former quarry at 49 Felstead Avenue in Toronto's east end, was closed due to low enrolment and the property was turned over to the MSSB (Metropolitan Separate School Board, now known as TCDSB) to be the new site for St. Patrick.

During the 1990s, after a long period of immigration to Toronto of many Catholic families, St. Patrick's had up to 1,500 students housed in the leased five storey school building.

Students chose to go to other schools in the area such as Neil McNeil, Notre Dame, Danforth Tech, and Malvern Collegiate.

In June 2010, St. Patrick was chosen to be a grade 9-12 Arts, Media and Technologies Centre by TCDSB and designated in February 2011 in an attempt to put the limits on enrolment sitting fewer than 500-600 students with the school below capacity, while nearby schools such as Neil McNeil and Notre Dame are overcrowded.

These skills enable each student to move forward to post-secondary goals of university, college, apprenticeship or the world of work.

St. Patrick has undergone extensive renovations with the purchase of new up-to-date facilities for theatre and visual arts, physical education and construction technology.