Three Huntsville area schools – Huntsville Public, Pine Glen, and Irwin Memorial (Dwight) – have been flagged as part of a Trillium Lakelands District School Board (TLDSB) process that reviews student enrollment numbers. None of the schools are at risk of being closed any time soon, but they are being watched and discussions are underway for plans to help them deal with enrollment concerns.
The review is mandated by the Ministry of Education and, in a letter to parents (PDF), TLDSB Director of Education, Larry Hope, noted that it is also a fiscally responsible move to address underutilized space in schools where there is low enrollment.
TLDSB has released a five-year Pupil Accommodation Long-Term Plan along with recommendations for schools (PDF) that should undergo a Pupil Accommodation Review (PAR). No Huntsville area schools have been recommended for a PAR. There are two schools, however, with declining enrollment.
At both Pine Glen and Irwin Memorial, student enrollment is projected to drop below 50 per cent of capacity within the next five years. Currently, Pine Glen has 216 of a possible 338 students; Irwin Memorial has 120 of a possible 211 students. (See enrollment numbers for all TLDSB schools here (PDF).)
Irwin Memorial Public School
“We are typically very accurate in our projections – within about 1 per cent – so we are confident in the numbers we have put forward over the next few years,” said Hope.
In some places there will be a tremendous amount of excess space but we have to take into consideration who might already be in the building as a partner, and the distance to the nearest school for students if we were going to conduct an accommodation review. We need to take into account many factors. It’s not always black and white – there’s a lot of grey area when it comes to studying a particular facility.
Larry Hope, TLDSB Director of Education
In both Pine Glen and Irwin Memorial, TLDSB will be looking at innovative community partnerships to utilize underused space.
“In the next little while, we will be putting out a call to our community partners – typically that means municipalities and other organizations who work closely with us – to see if there might be local groups or organizations that fit the criteria for using some of the excess space that might be in some of our schools. There are many wonderful examples of, for example, day cares being established in schools where there is space available. We’ve seen before and after care initiatives. We are also having a wide open conversation to see who else might be out there.”
That move comes partly as a result of decreasing government funding for the schools – the grants that the Board receives are tied to student enrollment.
“When it comes to our operating budget — the money we receive to heat and cool and keep up and clean our buildings – we saw a fairly significant reduction in that last year which will continue for the next two years. Those (Ministry of Education) grants are based solely on the number of students in our schools. We know at the end of the three years, because of declining enrollment, we will face $2.1 million less funding than we had before to keep our buildings up and running.
“(The Ministry) would never come in and tell us to close a school, instead they will tell us ‘here is the funding you will receive, we expect you to make good, wise decisions with that funding so that you can accommodate people properly.’”
Hope said that there were staffing reductions last year due to the $700,000 reduction in funding. “In this school year we’ve had to look closely at how we are using or not using empty space and in some cases had to close some of those classrooms down if the space wasn’t truly needed. It helps us to keep our costs in check with what we are receiving.”
Huntsville Public School
At Huntsville Public, the enrollment situation is the opposite of what Pine Glen and Irwin Memorial are experiencing: there is accommodation pressure as the school nears capacity. The school is at 95 per cent of its 512 student capacity and is expected to exceed 100 per cent in the 2017-18 and 2018-19 school years.
“The enrollment pressure is a bubble that’s coming in the next year or two,” said Hope. “There is a year coming up where I believe we have 40 grads from grade 8 and we anticipate 60 students coming in to junior kindergarten. That will put us really close (to capacity) and cause a bit of a problem. The challenge is that we are likely to only have that pressure for a year or two. It’s a short term problem we have to work toward resolving. We are already talking about scenarios and have had some informal conversations with the school principal, and we are watching enrollment numbers carefully to see where they land.”
More information on the accommodation review process is available on the TLDSB website here.
Why not move French Immersion from HPS to Pine Glen? These are students not attending their community schools so location would seemingly be less relevant.
Daycare within the empty classrooms would be a PERFECT solution for many reasons, especially when you articulate the fact that there is not enough spaces in the area to accommodate the need (particularly where infant care is involved). This would also benefit before/after school care needs and make the transition to full day kindergarten smooth for the children who have already been on-site receiving their early childhood education. Plus ECEs in the area would have some inspiring job opportunties as well!
So…ugly portables are a thing of the past…I hope. So why not reach out to the community to use the space in the evenings? And keep the rent reasonable. You still have to heat the space. Open it up!