With some of their urban schools surpassing their enrolment capacity mark, the Rocky View Schools (RVS) Board of Trustees is looking to shift the division's modular classrooms around from different schools in order to better handle an already difficult situation.
During the RVS board meeting on May 11, trustees voted in favour of relocating existing portable classrooms throughout the division to better handle the influx of students next September.
With the board’s approval of the plan, they will now seek confirmation from the Alberta government to move ahead with the modular relocations.
The school board had originally requested an additional 32 modulars from the Alberta government, but were disappointed to learn last month they would only receive funding for 10 new modulars and the relocation of two others.
“The numbers are shocking,” said Ward 1 (Chestermere) Trustee Shali Baziuk, referring to the number of students within some of RVS' schools. “Modulars are Band-Aids, and it feels like the Band-Aids are getting smaller and there’s less of them. What we could really use is schools.”
If the provincial government gives the green light on the new plan, the portables will begin moving to their new homes for the 2023-24 school year. W.H. Croxford High School in Airdrie will see an additional two units added, while Chestermere Lake Middle school will add three.
The plan will see three units added onto Northcott Prairie School in Airdrie, taking away one unit from Meadowbrook Middle School in Airdrie and two units from Cochrane’s Manachaban Middle School.
George McDougall High School in Airdrie was supposed to see two modulars added, but the new plan only sees that school receive one, while the other will relocate to Chestermere Lake Middle School.
Mitford School will also have its unit move to Meadowbrook, while Indus School in the southeast corner of Rocky View County will see no changes this year.
No schools in Cochrane will see modulars added to their schools, but will be losing three in total. This is due to projections showing student enrolment decreasing over the years at Manachaban School, moving from 108 per cent in 2022 down to 95 per cent in the year 2027. This decrease is due to some Manachaban students moving to attend a new middle school French Immersion program at Mitford School. As a result, RVS is requesting to move those modulars to Northcott Prairie in Airdrie as they won’t be needed immediately by Manachaban.
Plus, Cochrane Christian Academy will relocate to the currently vacant school on Powell Street in Cochrane in September, which frees up space at Mitford School's campus, where the faith-based academy is currently housed.
Cochrane’s Ward 6 Trustee, Fiona Gilbert, was the only member of the board to oppose the plan presented last Thursday. She took aim at the provincial government for prioritizing washrooms over classrooms.
“The government will give us washroom units to meet code for bathrooms before they will give us portables to meet space needs for students,” she said. “So it’s okay to have students learning in hallways and places that weren’t classrooms and not giving us the classrooms, but they’ll give us washroom units to meet that code.”
Gilbert said it is challenging to understand why the two modulars that were approved for Cochrane have been set to move to new locations. According to the trustee, Cochrane has the highest utilization rate in the three urban centres of RVS.
“From the four that we requested for Cochrane and the two that we received, the recommendation is to move those somewhere else,” Gilbert said. “I find that a little bit challenging because we do have needs in the Cochrane area as well.”
The plan will move ahead to the department of Alberta Education for final approval.
