Some St. Albert parents say they feel “blindsided” by a proposal made this week by Greater St. Albert Catholic that would shake up populations at five city schools.
Greater St. Albert Catholic trustees approved the Faith in Our Future business plan Monday alongside a months-long consultation program.
The plan, if implemented as proposed, would move all École Marie Poburan (EMP) students to École Secondaire Sainte Marguerite d’Youville (ESSMY), send ESSMY’s high school students to St. Albert Catholic High, put the St. Gabriel distance learning school and district office into the Marie Poburan building, rebuild École Father Jan at a new site in Riverside, and close 14 portables, all by 2024.
GSACRD officials said the plan would make more efficient use of space, replace the city’s oldest school building, improve health and safety, and save $2.78 million over five years.
The Gazette asked parents at some of these schools for their initial thoughts on the plan.
Stacey Jost and Genevieve Gray have six kids between them at EMP, ESSMY, and SACHS. They opposed the idea of moving Poburan’s students to ESSMY to create a K-9 school.
“We’re deeply concerned that the best interests of our children was not considered in this proposal,” Gray said.
Gray said parents were “blindsided” and “devastated” by this proposal, as they had received no indication that it had been in development for months.
“The logistics of moving (EMP) to (ESSMY) makes no sense whatsoever,” Gray said, and this plan did not address the costs it would involve.
Gray and Jost said moving EMP students to ESSMY would require extensive retrofits to the latter, as it was not built with little kids in mind. EMP’s Kindergarten-scale toilets and fountains would likewise have to be upsized for St. Gabriel’s high-schoolers.
Jost said this plan could put EMP’s young students at risk. ESSMY fronts onto Boudreau Road, which does not have a school zone and is one of the busiest roads in St. Albert, and has a busy back road between it and the nearest playground.
While she understood the rationale behind moving ESSMY’s high-school students to SACHS – ESSMY had 39 high-schoolers, which was not fiscally viable – Jost said she would prefer to see the program phased out so students currently at the school could graduate from it.
Marie Poburan was the one who lobbied to have EMP built and “she would be rolling in her grave probably” over this proposal, Gray said.
“She advocated to have that school built because French Immersion was thriving in the late ’80s, and our enrolment has never faltered,” she continued.
“This just makes no sense to us. Why would you take a gem like this away?”
Sad, but they get it
Heather Bell has two kids who attend Father Jan and one at ESSMY. She supported the idea of moving ESSMY’s high-schoolers to SACHS, noting her son plans to make the jump anyway, and found the idea of making it a K-9 school a good use of space.
“Father Jan definitely needs to be rebuilt,” she said, as it has warped floors in its portables and gets pretty hot in the summer.
“It is an old, old school.”
Bell was less enthusiastic about making it a dual-track school as proposed, as she said its single-track French nature was one of its strengths, and would be saddened to see it lose its current site, which had easy access to historic sites and the International Children’s Festival.
In an email, Michelle MacKay of the ESSMY parent council said she was saddened by but understood the rationale behind moving the school’s high-school program. Enrolment has dropped for many years, with many students saying they want the “high-school experience” without junior high students roaming the same halls.
“The flipside, however, is ESSMY’s junior high program is thriving,” she said, with some 261 students enrolled this year.
Adding 387 Poburan students to that was a “shocking” idea that would result in instant overcrowding and push those who wanted the junior high experience of having their own building to other schools.
“We should be building up the French Immersion program, not systemically setting it up for failure after failure,” MacKay said.
Parents can voice their thoughts on this plan via Thoughtexchange and at an open house on it at SACHS this Oct. 30 from 5 to 8 p.m.
See www.gsacrd.ab.ca/administration/faithinourfuture for more on the proposal.
