Some Holy Family students may be bused to St. John's, waiting for new school
The Newfoundland and Labrador English School District says it needs to move some K-6 students at a Paradise school due to overcrowding, as the board waits for a new school to be built.
While a new school is still under construction, there is a plan to move about 400 of the students at Holy Family School in Paradise to the former School for the Deaf on Topsail Road in St. John's — 12 kilometres away.
There's no space. We've done every creative thing in that school to utilize that space.- Darrin Pike
Darrin Pike, CEO of the school board, says with the growing school population, the board needed a plan while waiting for the new school to finish construction in 2016.
While the final decision hasn't been made yet, Pike said it's the only solution the school board could come up with.
"It's certainly one of the things we're considering and we'll go out for parent feedback," said Pike.
The school board is issuing a memo to parents on Thursday to advise them of the potential new building for their children.
"Next week we'll publish the information on our website, we'll have a parent information session, and then we'll have a chance for parents to give us feedback and then a final decision will be made," said Pike.
Pike said the plan with the new school is to split the student population currently attending Holy Family; the students who would be bused to the St. John's school would be the ones attending the newly-constructed K-6 school once it's finished.
'Band-Aid solutions'
Meanwhile, parent Chris LeDrew has a daughter in Grade 4 at Holy Family, and says the steadily growing student population there has most classes over capacity almost as soon as they're built.
"I'm actually kind of glad they're breaking the school apart because it will alleviate a lot of the issues, but one of my main concerns is for the younger children, grades ones and twos and even grade threes — it's a long day to be on a bus, probably an hour each way," said LeDrew.
He added that it's a temporary solution to a problem the board has known about for years, and should have acted sooner.
"They've known for years that the community's been going through expansive growth, they built a couple of new schools which immediately were at or over capacity, and they're just playing catch up — it's Band-Aid solutions."
However, Pike said the school board understands the frustrations parents must face, but there has to be something done.
"There's no space. We've done every creative thing in that school to utilize that space and there is no internal [space] and it's not just add on a classroom or add on a modular classroom for a little while," he said.
"You can imagine if you're a parent of a child in whatever grade … their friends are in that class and they may be from a neighbourhood that's close by, a street that's close by, and when you make a new catchment area you have to define that neighbourhood, you have to divide up the streets."
Pike said while there's still room for input and other possible solutions, it isn't possible to leave the school as it is with the number of students attending.