St. Agatha's elementary school avoids closure for 2nd time in 6 years

For the second time in six years, the aging St. Agatha Catholic Elementary School in Township of Wilmot has escaped closure, despite declining enrolment and a repair backlog estimated at $2 million.

The Waterloo Catholic District School Board trustees voted Monday night to keep the school open and instead will expand St. Agatha's boundary line into north Baden in September 2015 to increase enrolment.

The 30 students who live in the area that would be affected by the boundary change currently attend Holy Family Separate School in Baden. They will have the option of remaining at their school, but will not be provided with transportation.

The board also voted in favour of applying for provincial funding for the construction of a new school in Wilmot to eventually replace St. Agatha's, which is in need of more than $2 million in repairs and renovations. As the smallest school in the district, St. Agatha's had 100 students enrolled this year, which corresponds to a five-year capacity low of 59 per cent. 

The vote comes despite a recommendation from board staff to close the school in September 2015. Under that scenario, St. Agatha's students would have been sent to Holy Family, St. Clement Catholic School in St. Clements and Holy Rosary Catholic Elementary School in Waterloo.

The school had previously been the subject of an accommodation review committee six years ago, but survived that review.

Parents applaud vote

St. Agatha parents, students and principal Mary Mayer, erupted in applause as the vote to keep the school open passed five to three. 

"Our school is really, truly the heart of the community," said Mayer, who had been wringing her hands throughout the two hour meeting. 

The boundary change does not guarantee increased enrolment in the short term. At past board meetings, families within Holy Family have protested the idea of expanding St. Agatha's boundary line.

At a May board meeting, for instance, trustees heard one complaint from parents who said the option of sending their children to a nearby public school was more attractive than having them attend St. Agatha's. 

But trustees who were against the closure said they didn't want to reduce the number of Catholic elementary schools in Wilmot from two to one.

"When there are 20,000 people in Wilmot we should be able to support two Catholic schools. There's public schools and they're growing, and we need to find out why we're not," said trustee Greg Reitzel.

Trustee Joyce Anderson, a former teacher at a small rural school of 125 students, commented that continuing to operate St. Agatha's will take resources away from other schools in the board.

"The cost of maintaining students in a small school, any small school, is much much higher [than a larger school]," said Anderson. "The bottom line is I really don't think we can sustain the type of board and type of programs we want maintaining a large number of small schools."

Wayne Buchholtz, who just stepped down as school board chair in order to run for Kitchener council, raised a concern that allowing the smallest school in the district to stay open could set a precedent for future reviews that consider the closure of other schools. 

But Buchholtz didn't vote on the issue – he left the meeting early before the vote occurred, saying he had to attend a graduation.