Parents fight Edmonton school closures

Parents worried about school closures in Edmonton have a new ally. A group calling itself the Association for Responsive Trusteeship for Edmonton Schools plans to be at Tuesday night's meeting of the public school board to hand out brochures.

Trustees are expected to decide the fates of five central Edmonton schools at the meeting.

Capilano, Fulton Place, Eastwood, McCauley and Parkdale schools are all being considered for closure because of low enrolment. The elementary program at Spruce Avenue School could also be shut down.

ARTES is recruiting candidates to run for school board in the fall election — people like Michael Janz.

"We're trying to revitalize the core of our city," said Janz. "And it's very hard to do that when you're closing schools in the core. How do you attract young families into the core?"

Janz could be one of several candidates the new group supports during the October election.

Different viewpoints

The group was set up because many current trustees don't fully consider the legitimate points of view that parents bring up, said Karen Weis, who fought unsuccessfully to save Ritchie School from closure a couple of years ago.

"The main concern is that the decision-making is not genuinely happening," Weis said. "It's, I think, rubber-stamping what administration comes up with."

But the development of a lobby group to elect school board representatives worries former school trustee Svend Hansen.

"The biggest danger is a trustee being beholden to a certain group," he said. "They're dictating the policy and they're looking at block voting and, you know, I don't think that's healthy."

Christopher Spencer, a member of the new group, said it would not support block voting. The group is simply looking for people open to points of view other than those put forward by school administrators, he said.