By Ragnar Haagen

French immersion key issue in amalgamation

Apr 11, 2012 | 5:26 PM

As the only school forced to close its doors following a formal review, community members of Zenon Park have a right to be upset.

“As you can imagine, it’s pretty devastating for the Zenon Park parents to hear that their children’s school will be closed indefinitely at the end of this school year,” said Pam Wassill, who is a member of the review committee for Zenon Park school.

“I’m speaking on my own behalf, but I think I speak for the parents of Zenon Park too. It’s a devastating loss for our kids, ourselves, and our community.”

Early last fall, it was announced that Zenon Park, Arborfield and Bjorkdale would all be placed on review by the board of education of the North East School Division due to steadily declining enrollments. That forced them to take a long hard look at their three smallest K-12 schools.

The board finally decided that it wasn’t feasible to keep Zenon Park open, and the students would be transferred to Arborfield. Even though that school is only five minutes down the road, it is not much consolation for a community that has lost their school, and with it, a part of their identity.

Battle ready

Predators set to defend title as new PGLL season approaches

3h ago

Riderville

Riders Have Options Heading into Tuesday CFL Draft

8h ago

Weekend hockey

PAGC set to host largest Senator's Cup tournament to date

9h ago

“We are looking at two different issues. We’re looking at a facility closure, which would be École Zenon Park School, and we’re looking at our French immersion program,” Wassill explained.

“After many discussions and surveys to our community and input from parents, the priority clearly came out-French immersion programming. The benefits of that became our number one priority.”

The small bi-lingual community of Zenon Park has always had a rich history of francophone, ever since it was settled in 1910 by French-American’s from Quebec and the northeastern United States.

Now their issue becomes how to keep their identity during the amalgamation process and how much help they can expect from the school division.

“There’s been lots of talk and I think at the board meeting, virtually every board member voiced their support for French programming and French immersion programming so that was promising for us,” noted Wassill.

“I think in our presentations to the board, we clearly identified those benefits and we identified that French immersion is good for the students, good for the school, and good for the school division to lay claim to a program that is so successful. What we’re looking for is support from the division administration, support from the school division board and support from our parents and the teachers to try and make something work that will benefit both sets of students that will be coming together.”

In the end, Wassill believes the decision on how French programming will be worked into the new curriculum falls at the feet of the board, and that’s fine with her.

“If they support immersion then it will happen and I think that if the directions come from there, then we can work out the details locally,” Wassill said.

“It’s been an exhausting process and … I don’t think it’s fair to ask two groups of volunteer parents to hash out those details.”

As for the North East School Division, director of education Don Rempel calls the whole process challenging, especially if parents in Arborfield are not interested in their child learning a second language.

“Hopefully we can work together and create ways to offer programming so that we can have a sustainable French language program in the area and if it weren’t for that, this would be a very easy solution,” noted Rempel.

“French immersion programming in a designated school is by choice, so if a parent does not want their child in a French immersion program then we need to provide transportation to another school.”

In the past, if there were Zenon Park students who wanted English programming, they would be bussed to Arborfield, and vice versa if Arborfield students wanted French immersion.

The next closest English speaking schools are now in Tisdale and Carrot River, which would mean a 20 minute trip in the morning for both parent and student, as the school division is not obligated to provide bus service.

“Now we will have to look at what parent’s wishes are and that comes after we know what the program will be. We can’t force somebody into a designated school,” Rempel said.

“Another part of the bus policy in our school division is that you get transportation in the attendance area and you can attend other North East School Division schools outside the attendance area, but you must provide your own transportation.”

The school division has until the end of June to finalize its transition plan, and Rempel said they’ll do the best they can to get most of the decisions made and then see how things work out in the fall.

rhaagen@panow.com