MONTREAL – The English Montreal School Board may consider closing, moving or merging more than 20 schools as part of a major reorganization of its network for the 2012-13 academic year.
MONTREAL – A new report issued by the board’s Long Range Planning Committee, obtained by The Gazette on Sunday, outlines an action plan that, if adopted, could represent some major changes for parents, students and EMSB employees across the island.
Among those proposed changes are the relocations of several student populations, including that of Notre Dame de Grâce’s Royal Vale, currently housing an elementary school and a high school.
The elementary students would be moved to Hampstead school in Hampstead, while that school’s current student body would be moved to Westmount Park facility. Royal Vale high school students would move to the former Wagar High School in Côte St. Luc.
A total of 11 schools are listed in the report as candidates for closing.
For example, one scenario would see the merger of St. John Bosco school in Ville Émard with St. Gabriel’s school in Point St. Charles, with one of the buildings closing and the student bodies merged in the other.
The same is being proposed for St. Dorothy school in St. Michel and Our Lady of Pompei school in Ahuntsic.
In both scenarios, the report does not specify which of the two schools would be shuttered.
Julien Feldman, the English Montreal School Board commissioner for the Mile End area, said that is an example of the highly political nature of the 250-page document.
"They’re not making a firm proposal," he said. "It’s being savvy politically by saying we’re not going to upset one commissioner or another. They’ll just throw it to them and let them decide – but that’s not the way to proceed."
Shutting down an inner-city school like Bancroft elementary on St. Urbain St., which is listed as a candidate for closing, would mean many students would need to be bused to their new school, Feldman added, diminishing their access to after-school programs.
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"There are enough kids in that area to support a school," Feldman said. "Busing them further away reduces their access to after school programs, because they’re spending two hours a day on the bus."
While it recommends significant changes, the report does not spell doom for any of the schools mentioned in the document.
The EMSB will officially unveil the possible scenarios for restructuring at a special public meeting Wednesday, at which stage the board commissioners may ask the planning committee to look at alternative approaches.
That meeting is to be followed by another March 30, when the commissioners are expected to vote on whether even to consider any of the proposed changes.
If they do, it would launch a public consultation process that would include public hearings in December and culminate in final votes by commissioners in January.
On Sunday night, board chairwoman Angela Mancini stressed that the whole point of making Wednesday’s meeting public was to ensure parents and board members fully understand the recommendations before any decisions are made.
"There should not be schools that are surprised (to be included in the report), because in the three-year plan we adopted a while ago there was a list of schools that could be looked at in the next little while," she added. "We had also identified guiding principles for the Long Range Planning Committee … and now they’ve come up with more detailed scenarios."
Mancini said she has just begun to review the report.
"It should be made clear that these are not school closures," she said. "At Wednesday’s meeting, where we’re just getting information, there are no decisions being made."
Whatever may happen over the next year, however, Feldman said the commissioners should have been involved in drafting the report from the beginning.
"There was a report on the administrative functions of the board last year and one of the key recommendations was that commissioners be part of the Long Range Planning Committee," he said. "They’re not, and that’s partly how we could end up with a proposal of this nature which doesn’t really reflect the realities of the EMSB."
Since its creation in 1998, the board has closed 10 elementary schools, four high schools and one alternative school. Enrolment in its elementary and high schools has dropped by nearly 800 students from approximately 22,000 in the 2009-10 school year.
mmuise@ montrealgazette.com
PROPOSED CLOSINGS:
St. Gabriel’s or St. John Bosco
Our Lady of Pompei or St. Dorothy
St. Brendan (students moved to Dalkeith or Nesbitt School)
Fraser Academy (students moved to John Caboto School)
Bancroft (students moved to Sinclair Laird School)
Carlyle (students moved to Coronation Core Program)
Hampstead (students moved to Westmount Park building)
James Lyng High (students moved to Royal Vale building)
Nesbitt (students moved to Edward Murphy, Dalkeith, and/or Gerald McShane)
PROPOSED RELOCATIONS OR CONSOLIDATIONS:
Royal Vale Elementary (to Hampstead building)
Royal Vale High (to old Wagar high school)
Marymount High (to Royal Vale building)
Marymount Adult Education Centre (to Marymount facility)
Vezina High (to St. Monica or James Lyng High building)
St. Raphael (to St. Dorothy or our Lady of Pompei or other building deemed appropriate)
Programme Mile End (to Bancroft building)
Vincent Massey (to Pius X building)
Laurier MacDonald vocational training centre (to an empty facility to be determined)
Perspectives II High (to St. Brendan)
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