London District Catholic School Board capping French immersion JK registrations

A spokesperson for the local Catholic school board is calling it a good problem to have.

The London District Catholic School Board is putting a cap on the number of JK registrations they’ll allow for French immersion schools for the 2017-18 school year.

Communication and Faith Liaison Officer Mark Adkinson tells AM980 french immersion has been growing in popularity over the past few years.

“It’s been something that’s been difficult to track and it’s not just our board, it’s other boards across the province and we’ve actually seen almost a doubling in the past five years at a couple of our schools, so right now we’re seeing a bit of a crunch at our two catholic french elementary schools in London where we’re just simply running out of space,” said Adkinson.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "It's been something that's been difficult to track and it's not just our board, it's other boards across the province and we've actually seen almost a doubling in the past five years at a couple of our schools, so right now we're seeing a bit of a crunch at our two catholic french elementary schools in London where we're just simply running out of space," said Adkinson.

Adkinson notes the nearly-completed new St. John School in Hyde Park does not have a cap, but that could change.

“It’s expected to open up in September,” he said. “It’s a brand new school and we’re thinking that we might be full the day that it opens, so right now there’s not a hard cap at St. John’s but as registrations continue to come in and as people see the school nearing completion, we expect to have more registrations and be close to capacity when it opens in September.”

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "It's expected to open up in September," he said. "It's a brand new school and we're thinking that we might be full the day that it opens, so right now there's not a hard cap at St. John's but as registrations continue to come in and as people see the school nearing completion, we expect to have more registrations and be close to capacity when it opens in September."

The recently expanded St. Anthony school in south London already has nearly 75 JK registrations for the fall and is setting a cap at 80.