The shock is wearing off and Saskatchewan communities affected by recent announcements that their schools will close are starting to look at their options.
Some have accepted their fate but others are fighting back. The Save Our Schools lobby has hired an educational consultant to develop a proposal for a “small school” rural division. It is also obtaining a legal opinion on the school closures announced so far.
“In a democracy, the people can speak, react and take action to turn unfair, unreasonable and heavy-handed decisions around and that is exactly what SOS lobby intends to do,” said spokesperson David Gleim in a News release
Read Also
Stock dogs show off herding skills at Ag in Motion
Stock dogs draw a crowd at Ag in Motion. Border collies and other herding breeds are well known for the work they do on the farm.
news.
A total of 23 schools, most of them rural, will close this year or next.
The most recent announcement was May 22 in Prairie South School Division, where the board announced that Briercrest, Limerick, Crane Valley, Willow Bunch and Moose Jaw’s Ecole Ross will close in August.
Chaplin school was given a reprieve until July 15, 2009.
Also closing this year are schools in Admiral, Broadway in Melfort, Earl Grey, Francis, Glenavon, Gray, Lang, MacDowall, Neville, Odessa, Piapot, Saar in Kronau, Smeaton, Sylvania and Wilcox.
In 2008, Carl Frederickson school in Govan will close, as will schools in Climax and Richmound. Other schools saw grades discontinued.
The Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association and Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities have called for a moratorium on school closures for at least one year so that communities can evaluate their situations.
SUMA and SARM have been working on an economic development initiative and say that closing schools could undermine that effort.
“Our province is admittedly in an economic boom and the education infrastructure is already in place,” noted SARM president David Marit.
Projects like the kaolin mine, a clay mineral product sometimes used as a cement substitute, under development near Wood Mountain, where the school closed years ago, is an example.
The SOS lobby and representatives from SARM, SUMA and several communities met with assistant deputy learning minister Helen Horsman May 31 to ask for a moratorium. They wanted to meet with learning minister Deb Higgins and premier Lorne Calvert.
A news conference was tentatively planned for this week to outline the lobby’s next steps.
The South East Cornerstone School Division had announced earlier this year that 12 of its 41 schools were under review but none would close in 2007. The director of education is on a fact-finding mission and is to report back to the board in October.
The schools on the list in that division are 33 Central School in Fillmore, Carievale, Frobisher, Gladmar, Lyndale in Oungre, Macoun, Manor, Maryfield, Ogema, Pangman, Wapella and Yellow Grass.
Maryfield residents have already taken steps to keep their school open. They are trying to establish a curling school that would attract international students to their town.
