Over 23,000 students in North and West Vancouver schools head back to the classrooms on Tuesday for a new school year.
Changes on the horizon this September include the start of construction on a new $61-million Argyle Secondary while students in the overcrowded neighbourhoods near Ridgeway and Queen Mary will have to make do with portables until the province gives the go-ahead for a new school on the site of the old Cloverley building.
The beginning of school is expected to be a smoother ride than it was last year, when many school districts were still scrambling at this time to fill teaching positions.
“It’s way more stable than last year,” said Chris Kennedy, superintendent of schools for West Vancouver where the number of new teachers is about 20, compared to 40 or 50 last year.
Specialty positions like French immersion and learning support teachers remain the most challenging to fill in both school districts.
Enrolment for both school districts is expected to remain relatively stable. In North Vancouver, about 15,300 regular students are expected, plus 745 international fee-paying students. In West Vancouver, enrolment of 7,300 includes about 520 international students.
About 1,200 students who attend West Vancouver schools don’t actually live in the community, but make the trek from other parts of the Lower Mainland. Families are attracted to the district both by specialty academy programs and by the district’s “strong academic reputation,” said Kennedy.
Schools in the eastern part of the district, closer to Taylor Way, are the fullest.
Kennedy said he’s also expecting the large growth in the number of English Language Learner students in the past several years to begin levelling off.
That’s an area that has seen “massive growth over the past decade,” said Kennedy, fuelled by a wave of immigration from China over the past five years.
Statistics last year indicated English Language Learner students now make up about 40 per cent of Grade 1 students and half the elementary school populations at Chartwell and Hollyburn.
Status quo budgets in both school districts this year point to a lack of significant changes over last year – for the time being, anyway.
In North Vancouver, work on a new Argyle Secondary is finally getting underway on the school site. The start of construction was delayed earlier in the year after school district officials learned none of the bids on the project – then estimated at $50 million – had come in close to that figure. During the two years that final design was being worked on, construction costs increased significantly, said Deneka Michaud, spokeswoman for the North Vancouver school district.
After discussions, the province agreed to pay for that increase. The final budget for the project is $61 million, with no change to the design, said Michaud.
Meanwhile, students at Irwin Park Elementary in West Vancouver will notice some changes when they head back to school next week, thanks to a significant renovation carried out over the summer. “It’s the closest thing to a new school without being a new school,” said Kennedy. “It’s a massive undertaking to do over a summer.”
Two new programs that focus on activities outside the classroom will be launched this year in North Vancouver – a reboot of the district’s new outdoor education academy and a new lacrosse academy. In West Vancouver, the district’s relatively recent robotics academy continues to be a significant draw, said Kennedy.
Parents of younger children in North Vancouver will likely find more digital and face-to-face communications coming their way this year instead of written report cards. Teachers of kindergarten classes in five schools including Seymour Heights, Upper Lynn, Cove Cliff, Dorothy Lynas and Larson will be experimenting with posting students’ work online for parents to view on a regular basis. Schools feeding into Carson Secondary will also be conducting three-way conferences with parents, teachers and students instead of comments or letter grades on first report cards.
