Parents and residents of Stave Falls want their school re-opened.
Representatives of the Stave Falls Community Association, along with a group of supporters, attended the Mission School District’s Committee of the Whole School meeting on Tuesday night to provide information on the possible fate of Stave Falls Elementary School.
Julia Renkema spoke on behalf of the Association and told committee members that she was on hand to support the idea of re-opening the school and to ask the board to conduct a pre-registration to more accurately assess the number of students that could potentially attend the school.
Built in 1994, Stave Falls Elementary was closed in 2008 due to declining enrollment.
According to Renkema, when the school closed, many parents decided to enroll their children in Maple Ridge while others decided to home school.
In early 2016, it was announced that the school district was looking into selling four unused schools, one of them was Stave Falls.
“The community of Stave Falls was not prepared to allow this to happen,” said Renkema.
After submitting a proposal to the school board concerning the importance of keeping the school, the association began to conduct an online survey.
“Out of a potential 734 respondents we received over 250 completed surveys. The number one response was the community wanted it to be a public school.”
The survey results also indicated that 150 children between the ages of new born and 12 lived in the area.
“We conservatively calculated a total number of children, based on a 100 per cent response rate, we predict we could have well over 300 school-aged children,” she told the committee.
Noting the recent Supreme Court of Canada decision to move class sizes and composition to 2002 levels, Renkema said Mission will need more teachers and more classroom space.
“The timing is perfect to open Stave Falls. Here is a building that is fairly new, and can easily accommodate 250 students.”
She then formally request that the school board conduct a registration in September for the Stave Falls Elementary School year starting 2018 and beyond.
Superintendent Angus Wilson told the crowd there is a spectrum of options for Stave Falls Elementary – everything from a full opening of the school, re-opening a portion of the school, leasing it entirely to a separate party, re-open and share the space as a hybrid school or sell the property outright.
“There are pluses and minuses to all these different possibilities,” said Wilson adding the board has to examine the cost impacts of all of them.
While he called it a beautiful building, Wilson said it isn’t “a turnkey operation,” noting it needs some work.
Vandalism, leaking skylights and other maintenance is needed before it could be used. It also needs new computers and a library if it was to be opened.
“There’s a lot of work to be done. The school cannot be opened tomorrow and accept students.”
He estimates it would cost $300,000 to re-open as a functioning school.
However, Wilson also noted that Stave Falls Elementary does qualify as a rural school and is eligible for funding of about $164,000 a year, after the first year of operation, in addition to regular funding. He also said there is a benefit to having a school in the community.
Another aspect that needs to be examined is the impact opening the school would have on Silverdale Elementary, which is the closest neighbouring school and has many student from the Stave Falls area.
“Silverdale has a bit over 100 students in it currently, it’s one of our smallest schools in the district, and there’s a concern that if we open Stave Falls, it (Silverdale) will lose enough students that then we have to look at Silverdale… Opening one school just to close another isn’t necessarily a wise decision,” said Wilson.
No decision was made on Tuesday night – it was an information only meeting, but several school board members indicated they would be open to the idea of performing a registration as asked for by the association, to get a better indication of potential student enrollment.
The board is not expected to address the issue again until September.
