Harbour Landing School of the Regina Public Schools and St. Kateri Tekakwitha School of the Regina Catholic School Division are over-capacity.
The two schools are side by side in Regina’s Harbour Landing neighbourhood, where concerns are being heard from government to families of students.
Harbour Landing School was originally built for 650 students but they currently have over 1,000 registered students. Classrooms have doubled, spaces are limited and even parking for parents to drop off and pick up their kids at school is proving scarce.
Regina Public Schools denied an interview with Global News, stating they do not have any further information to share on the subject.
The Saskatchewan Ministry Education responded in an email statement that the new joint-use school in Harbour Landing West was announced in March 2020.
“The Ministry of Education and the Ministry of SaskBuilds and Procurement are currently in negotiations with the City of Regina on a location and we are eager to move forward and expedite the site selection,” the email stated.
“The Ministry of Education is aware that there are capacity concerns regarding Harbour Landing School. The ministry continues to work closely with the school boards.”
Saskatchewan NDP education critic Matt Love said these concerns are nothing new as he heard from both school divisions about the challenges these two schools face. He said they are hearings stories of teachers teaching in stairwells, using spaces that were never designed for instruction.
“These concerns have been there from day one, more or less. From the moment that these schools are open, they’ve been at or over-capacity,” said Love.
“There are concerns going back to when these schools were designed, looking at the surrounding community and the needs for the school.”
Love said it’s unique in the sense that these issues are well known to this government and certainly could be avoided if the society government was willing to listen and act on behalf of these concerns.
The St. Kateri Tekakwitha School building capacity with all eight portables is 575, and according to an enrolment report provided by the Regina Catholic School Division, as of Dec. 30, 2022, the student population is at 684.