This week's headlines say it all:
DECLINING ENROLMENT: Blamed on shifting demographics, low birthrates
From the Feb. 4th Province Newspaper:
For the past few years, North Vancouver school district has lost about 450 students a year and the board has closed four schools. Balmoral Jr. Secondary School, above, is now on the endangered list. Photograph by : Nick Procaylo, The Province .
We've got a lot of empty schools. But are we ready for more?
Since 2000-01, B.C.'s public-school system has lost 42,534 students, prompting closure of more than 130 schools, many shut after bitter protests.
The Ministry of Education is now predicting another drop of 30,000 students over five years. If current closure rates hold, nearly 100 more schools could be abandoned.
The declining enrolments are a side-effect of two social trends that trustees around B.C. are grappling with: shifting demographics and declining birthrates.
Education Minister Shirley Bond predicts that enrolment won't even stabilize until 2015. This year alone it fell by 12,336 students, leaving 555,414 in the system.
Numbers are down in all but four of 60 districts: Surrey, New Westminster, West Vancouver and the Conseil Scolaire Francophone. Thirty-nine districts have closed schools.
B.C.Teachers Federation president Jinny Sims says declining enrolment is real, but argues that it's less to blame for closures than funding formulas.
Imagine an elementary school of children vanishing each year.
That's the reality North Vancouver board chair Chris Dorais faces. His district's lost 450 students each of the past few years. Because funding is provided on a per-student basis, his board's closed four schools so far. Last week, it became the latest to put a school on the endangered list: Balmoral Jr. Secondary. About 300 parents, students and staff protested. The board is weighing its options, but Dorais is realistic: This school year, eight boards have put another 24 schools on closure notice.
46 opinions/comments:
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I hate to be cynical, but no one really cares about School Board. School Trustees are not worth much to this community. All the work and decision-making is done by the Admistration and simply rubber-stamped by the Trustees, the same trustees that voted themselves a big raise for serving absolutely no purpose whatsoever. The provincial government should scrap School Boards altogether.
As a person who went to Balmoral, I find it sad that the school is being closed down.
I do, however want to ask the question I have asked before on this blog;
If school are being closed because there are no longer enough children, and young people cannot afford to buy or start a family here, and the age with the largest number of people will reach this year is 60 (which means in 20 years the population will be drastically reduced) then who is all the massive development being built for?
The second question is where will all the revenue from the selling of school properties go since we no longer have a population of children to build for?
I agree with closing school that are not required. However, I don't believe in selling these assets.
They should be kept for use by the community. If business could be set up in the existing infrastrure then we should look to getting money for the short term. ESL colleges, or traditional offices, fitness clubs, Garden centres or workshops for local trades people. We could use the fields for existing sport use or convert them in to Victory Gardens (victory in defeating global warming)
Longterm I sure we can use the property to build geriatric care facilities to house the bubble of baby boomers that will require it in the coming decade (s). We should then plan to convert the space into maybe social housing. For in 20 plus years we will have the same problem with care facilities as we do today with schools.
How great an impact do you think that private schools are having? Look at the enrolment of Mulgrave and others which parents choose over the public system, at great expense. Maybe the school board should be doing a little introspective thinking.
As we have pointed out on the blog before, with proper long term and comprehensive community planning there will never be any need to close schools.
1) Schools should be used for childcare space for which there is a desperate shortage. Indeed, childcare should be part and parcel of the education system as is the case in ALL other developed countries and has been since the end of WW I.
2) Schools should be dedicated to multi-purpose community use. They have been paid for by the taxpayers and should be used to the full. There are a hundred potential uses including health, recreation, art, music, community, adult education and social activities.
It requires co-operation between municipal and provincial jurisdictions and includes areas in the adult education, social, health, recreation, art and music fields, to mention but a few.
It requires first and foremost leadership by the municipal government.
3) The municipality can play a key role in the long term housing and population growth stability of neighbourhoods by building co-op housing. Instead of market housing which is unstable, co-op hosing, a form of non-profit housing, provides stable populations including young families.
Once again the municipalitay can play a key role by leasing land which means the municipality will protect its fiscal interests and may even act as banker by using it's Heritage Fund (instead of using it as a slush fund) to accommodate such housing without any fiscal downside while, at the same time, providing a solution to the affordable housing crisis without adversly impacting existing neighborhoods.
The key is Leadership and stepping outside the little box and daring to think bigger and be bolder and more imaginative.
Can you match this wihtout being abusive???
I noticed Sue Cook posted on this topic. Sue, I just wanted to say congratulations on the Bill Bell article. Bill did a great job of reminding everyone how hard you have been woking as a community activist, particularly on lower lonsdale issues. I only wish that Bill would have mentioned that you are being encouraged to run for the Green Party. Have you made any decision on that yet?
Barry, any chance we can get a separate entry about Bill Bell's provocative column in the North Shore News about Sue Cook and Lower Lonsdale?
I'll bet it touched some serious nerves both in Lower Lonsdale, and at City Hall!
Yeah, like the gag reflex.
Sorry Bill Bells article hit somebody's gag reflex.....oh well can't please them all.
The good news is that as of today the City has picked up large articles in the alley way including an old stove that had been there for months. They have also done a major clean up of the Presentation House Grounds, and today, just before I went out the door for an interview I heard a large engine outside - to my shock there was the street cleaner (also went down the alley)
I think this is a wonderful start from City Hall, now I think the neighbors will be far more willing to get involved in helping keep the area clean. I still hope that City will have a community meeting at Presentation House where we can all have an informal chat (including with the RCMP) and get some really positive stuff stared.
In terms of running for the Greens, I have another major battle going and that is trying to find employment as a person who is now 60.
If I do not have work by the end of March I will have to leave North Vancouver - I know at least one person reading this blog will be very pleased once that happens - right GSP?
I still want to get to my original question - if all the stats are indicating the population is acutally decreasing why all the building and support of large density increase?
You assume too much. I doubt Georgie gives you a second thought.
Actually bill Bell´s article did hit the gag reflex of city council...they can´t hold down any criticism of their so called progressive policies
OK so here is my question...
Should the District council 'up-zone' the school properties in order to help their cash-strapped partner get top dollar or should they hold the line in order show their displeasure at the probable closure and sale?
Re School buildings - what do you think of a referdum on what they should do with the buildings? I agree with the other blogger that thought the grounds should be changed into parks and playgrounds.
It is probably a tricky question as to whether the profit of the sales go back into the school district - I would think that it is costing a pretty penny to run the Outdoor School - does anyone know the cost?
What really worries me is that it is obvious the GVRD is NOT being built for families and I find that very disturbing.
What is not clear in this debate is the differentiation between public and private schools.
Does the increase in private schools outstrip the decrease in public schools, and if so there is an indication private schools are precieved as doing a better job of elementary education.
With any debate all sides have to be looked at.
What are the real numbers anybody.
The private school sector may pick up a lot of the schools on long term leases if the price is right. People are keen on sending their children to some sorts of private schools these days in order to have more control over what their children are being taught and how, among other things.
The public schools, if closed, must be kept as public property. As the demographics change over the decades, the school land will be needed for new schools to educate the generations to come. Happened before. It'll happen again.
I certainly agree with Ernie Crist's points. I think they were well thought out and well expressed. It is ludicrous to close schools.
Please refresh my memory, but was there not a group of parents that wanted to buy Hamilton Junior High, but were refused by the North Van School Board and then they bought a property in West Van?
I think that this was a private school concept and that is why the NVSD did not want to sell to that group of parents, but this was all quite a long time ago. My memory may be a bit rusty on this
Please refresh my memory, but was there not a group of parents that wanted to buy Hamilton Junior High, but were refused by the North Van School Board and then they bought a property in West Van?
I think that this was a private school concept and that is why the NVSD did not want to sell to that group of parents, but this was all quite a long time ago. My memory may be a bit rusty on this
I fully agree with Ernie Crist. Nowhere is the utter stupidity of our whole system of governance more apparent than that at a time when we are talking about closing Balmoral School only a short distance away they are building a new French Immersion school.
If this is not insanity then I don't know what is. Again, Ernie is right on and it is no wonder that he and his political friends are being attacked. Why should he not?... he is sane.
Has Bill Bell got permission to write outside the box and about the box as seen from the outside?
I agree with most of what Ernie is saying as well. The thing is, I do not think that past school boards have given a lot of choice to parents. I am not sure about the new school board, as my children are all grown. But if choices are not given then parents will find alternate forms of education. I think this is what happened when the parents could not buy the Hamilton space.
In terms of community use, it seems to me that there were some community schools in North Vancouver - Westview (which is now closed was one of them). Do they still have community schools as a concept?
I don't quite follow Ernie's logic that because Schools have been paid for by the taxpayers, they should be used to the full. The same has been said about the North Vancouver Recreation buildings, and look at the cost of maintaining them, if not outright building anew.... what's the current price tag on the recreation facilities.... $500 million.
Keeping the school for retiring baby boomers to exercise in, sounds like an excellent idea, but still, the cost of the buildings will have to be factored in to the formula.
Once again - this is what Ernie said which makes total sense and I agree with him................
" Schools should be used for childcare space for which there is a desperate shortage. Indeed, childcare should be part and parcel of the education system as is the case in ALL other developed countries and has been since the end of WW I.
2) Schools should be dedicated to multi-purpose community use. They have been paid for by the taxpayers and should be used to the full. There are a hundred potential uses including health, recreation, art, music, community, adult education and social activities.
3) The municipality can play a key role in the long term housing and population growth stability of neighbourhoods by building co-op housing. Instead of market housing which is unstable, co-op hosing, a form of non-profit housing, provides stable populations including young families."
The thing is these schools have already been built with tax payer dollars and most where built in a time when North Vancouver was growing. On the street that I grew up on nearly every family on the street had an average of 4 children, so the demands were huge.
While it may be that some of these structures could be old and maybe unsafe there is still a major problem that North Vancouver (both City and District) are NOT being built for young families. While there are countless discussions on the density issue the question is still - what kind of a community are we building. Is it only for very wealthy childless people with a mixture of financially challenged seniors?
I like the concept of community schools (which was in place when my kids were in school), but I also believe we MUST find a way for young families to live here and keep our schools going.
Sue, I really hope you don't move away. We need you!
Ernie,
On this issue it is apparent that we have some common ground. ie We both agree that these school assets should be kept for community use. I think space for child care is an excellent idea.
However, when you talk about universal early childhood education and co-op housing it makes me realize why I would never make it in politics. Too often politicians have many wonderful ideas...too many as a mater of fact. They take a simple idea and make it a complex problem.
What should we do with the under utilized, public school and the surrounding property?
Answer: keep it for other community uses. (to me this is a simple solution that many people from different political backgrounds can agree on) A grassroots movement could surely preserve these assets. The costs would pretty neutral (little revenue but minimal expenses)
Ernie goes on, not only should we use this for community use, but it should be firstly for Universal Child Care/Early child hood education(ECE), like much of europe.
This is a contensious issue. Many are pro ECE while others rather see more resource given to families. Regardless, adding ECE would vastly increase the cost of this decision.
Then you add Social/Co-op housing.
There is no doubt that we need diverse housing on the north shore to accomadate the many different types of people that live here. However, this is another big cost.
We can either.
Preserve these sites for public use.
Or tie preserving these sites with universal Early childhood education and social housing.
Lets solve one issue at a time. Each has merits and needs to be discussed. But by layering all the issues into one big bite we risk that it may be too big for society and government to swallow.
The thing I am not understanding in this discussion is why even argue about the merits of schools turning into day care centers if there are NO children to take care of?
The North Shore is not building family units. They are actually keeping (and forcing) families out of North Vancouver because of the housing costs. Also, where are the plans for play grounds for children, are any new schools being designed for the areas of the highest new density?
It is so clear to me that there is some kind of "eye in the sky" thought by local politicans that 2010 is going to be magic and all the super rich, childless people with money to burn baby burn are all going to come flocking into North Vancouver.
Ernie is totally right regarding mixed housing stock for a balanced and healthy community.
The thing I am not understanding in this discussion is why even argue about the merits of schools turning into day care centers if there are NO children to take care of?
The North Shore is not building family units. They are actually keeping (and forcing) families out of North Vancouver because of the housing costs. Also, where are the plans for play grounds for children, are any new schools being designed for the areas of the highest new density?
It is so clear to me that there is some kind of "eye in the sky" thought by local politicans that 2010 is going to be magic and all the super rich, childless people with money to burn baby burn are all going to come flocking into North Vancouver.
Ernie is totally right regarding mixed housing stock for a balanced and healthy community.
School Boards should be dissolved. Their "responsibilities" could easily be taken over my muinicipal councils which would give Councils full control of school facilities 24/7. As Trustees actually do very little, the additional workload to Councils would be minimal. Municipalities could also set up a Schools Commission, similar to the Recreation Commission model. Taxpayers would benefit by doing away with the unneccesary expense of School Boards.
Co-op housing carries no social cost. The only difference between market housing and co-op housing is that the owner occupier requires no down payment. In return he/she cannot make any profit when the unit is sold.
Monthly payments are based on income but not at the cost of society. The land is leased from the municipality at market and remains in the ownership of the municipality unless a co-op decides to purchase the land which is also possible and has happened. But there is still no profit to be made by the individual owner.
The reason co-ops provide demographic stability is because when the older members leave or die younger families move in. The co-op has control.
We have several successful co-ops in the District. What is needed is an initial (government) banker. But the banker will get every penny back and with interest.
It is not a social cost.
Also, co-ops are maintained because the people owning the units take pride in their upkeep. They will be compensated for improvements they have made to the interior of the units when they leave.
The Federal and Provincial Governments stopped financing co-ops at the behest of big real estate interests.
The District could have financed co-ops by using its Heritage Fund as a sure investment fund instead of using it as a slush fund.
The District would be better off and the schools would not have to be closed and our younger North Shore people could have stayed in the municipality they grew up in.
Sounds like a reasonable idea. What would be the down side?
The downside is interfering not only with Darwin's law of the survival of the "fittest" but also the survival of the fattest all in one place.
What everybody is missing here is that the reason kids are not being enrolled in the public system is that the public system cannot handle the escalating number of kids with autism and ADHD. The Campbell government cut back funding for these kids. So...where do their parents take them? Into the independent system. Check out today's Vancouver Courier, where my sister, Janet Hamilton, who is the director of an independent school, Madrona, has addressed these issues.
I hope if they do sell the school they keep the playing fields. As bad as they are, those fields are one of the few places where night soccer practices can be held, and they are used every weeknight until late, by hundreds of kids every night.
I'm talking about Balmoral, of course.
"Flaming Wendy" favours Vancouver politics and children
Madrona 2007
Madrona 2006
Madrona 2004
David Emerson 2007
Even though I have many question marks about School District 44, when I did run for School Board I did learn some good things.
I think people should recognize that this school district has tried to get some alternate programs in place. The one that sticks out the most is Windsor House.
Windsor House was started by a fabulous person called Helen Hughes (who was one of the best teachers I have ever had in my life). I think the atmosphere is very safe and positive. The other school is Keith Lynn Alternate School.
I am not a teacher, but I think one of the biggest challenges is trying to meet the many different ways that people learn. One group that has been completely overlooked in my opinion are those who think with a creative mind.
In any case I think the whole school issue is very alarming - the fact they have to be closed because we do not have enough children to fill them is not a good sign.
"Village idiot" once again you missed the point on the recreation issue.
It is part and parcel of the preventive halth care system and the "healthy community".
Have you still not grasped the fact that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure?. Have you still not grasped that under Don Bell the facilities have been allowed to deriorate for lack of maintenance at a time when the District sold hundreds of millions of dollars worth of land while raising taxes at the same time from the lowest in the region to the highest?
"village idiot" You should have never provoked "Flaming Wendy".
Anonymous Thursday, February 08, 2007 1:05:40 PM
Have you not grasped the fact that Don Bell will not be back to right the wrongs that you claim he imposed on District of North Vancouver taxpayers?
He's flown the coop.
As to Flaming Wendy, my error, I should have said Inflamatory Wendy.
"village idiot" I knew you made the commment unwittingly but it will stick because it is fitting. Don't feel too bad about it. It might even become a famous quote.
The older generation may have become sceptical or even cynical but if we send Don Bell back to Ottawa we will definitley send the wrong message to the young people of this country.
Like Sue I also am a Balmoral alumnus.
My last personal contact with the school was when my daughter was taking her String classes in the portable behind the school - two days a week, one at Balmoral one at Argyle. I have a niece attending Balmoral now.
Frankly I'd be surprised if the gym there was suitable for adult fitness classes.
Declining enrollments is partly the birthrate generally and the ongoing gentrification of North Vancouver in particular.
There's a reason why enrollments are rising in Surrey and falling here - I've lost one employee chiefly because she and her husband bought in Surrey after renting in North Vancouver. I have another likely to go eventually for the same reason.
This is a price we as a community pay for the housing policy we have. School enrollments are only part of the picture.
As for the School Board, I wish I could say I find them even as responsive as Council but I'm sorry I can't. I know several of the trustees but they're just invisible most of the time.
What a coincidenc! Less than a year after the expensive new French Emersion school on West Kings was completed, Balmoral school, just across the street is closed for lack of enrollment. Surely,a little planning could have saved North Vancouver taxpayers many millions of dollars. No wonder,district tax increases year after year exceed the inflation rate
What a coincidenc! Less than a year after the expensive new French Emersion school on West Kings was completed, Balmoral school, just across the street is closed for lack of enrollment. Surely,a little planning could have saved North Vancouver taxpayers many millions of dollars. No wonder,district tax increases year after year exceed the inflation rate
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