A small Alberta town wants to promote its western ambience by adding a horsemanship component to its elementary school.
Manyberries, located in the southeastern corner of Alberta, is in the same boat as many other rural schools where school divisions are hard pressed to keep a facility open for a handful of students.
“We’re trying to do something about what every small rural area is facing,” said Lee Finstad, who has two children attending Manyberries school.
“We decided to be proactive rather than waiting for the inevitable.”
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There are 26 children ranging from Grades 1 to 6 with a privately run kindergarten. There are two full-time teachers and the students are split into three grades per classroom.
The community lost its junior and senior high school five years ago and older students must travel 40 kilometres to continue their studies.
Community members started brainstorming and came up with the idea of an alternative school emphasizing equestrian studies.
The goal is to open in 2006 with a horsemanship program for elementary aged children. The school would still provide the approved Alberta Education curriculum. Horses would be available on site with teachers certified through the Alberta Equestrian Federation.
Horsemanship would take about two hours per day and fit in with a new mandate from Alberta Education to provide students with at least 30 minutes per day of physical activity starting this September.
The big challenge is building an indoor arena at a cost of $300,000.
The community has been fundraising, staging concerts by Alberta singer Ian Tyson and a bluegrass group. It is applying for casino licences to raise money as a registered charity along with anything else people can think of.
The concept is eligible for a number of government matching grants.
The school would likely charge $2,000 in additional fees per year and local students who are not interested in the horse training would have other activities.
Finstad estimates the school needs another 30 students to make the concept viable. Organizers hope to draw students from a 50 km radius including Medicine Hat. They do not plan to offer a residence because the children are too young to live away from home.
The Manyberries group wants to model the concept after a girls’ hockey school in Warner, a small town south of Lethbridge, that faced closure as well. The program established in 2003 has become so successful, girls are going on a waiting list to attend.
So far, nine different rural communities have contacted principal Mark Lowe at Warner for advice on how to start their own alternative programs to save their schools.
“Determine your strengths and try and build on it,” he said.
Community support and volunteer efforts have been critical for Warner’s fundraising efforts and for working with the new students.
“We are going through an organizational period where we are looking at how we will organize in the long term,” Lowe said.
“We are finding some kinks because no one else has ever done this kind of thing before so how we structure ourselves will be breaking new ground.”
The first year of operation, 20 new girls joined. The next year 24 girls came and some went on a waiting list. This coming year there are only six spots remaining with at least 10 applicants from across Canada and the United States.
Those extra girls boosted the school population from 100 to 125 for the town of 380 people. It has created six full-time jobs for teachers, coaches and support staff.
Warner school is starting a day program for additional students. It is a hockey skills training program and participants will play on their regular hockey teams rather than joining the school team. It is open to boys and girls.
Renovations on an old church are almost complete to house 22 people as a school residence. That is costing about $300,000 and is just a small part of the added facilities this popular concept requires.
“Our facilities are what is holding us back,” said Lowe.
“We just don’t have enough beds for all these girls.”
