The capital region’s school superintendents are ready for the student shuffle this week with one district expecting up to 400 new students.
“We don’t know until we see the students this week but we’ll have somewhere in the neighbourhood of another 350 to 400 students — up to 400 new students every year for the foreseeable future,” said Sooke school district superintendent Scott Stinson.
The district has added five new portables, converted new classroom space and computer labs in schools.
“We’re trying to find space wherever we can in the district to make sure we can accommodate all the new students coming to us,” Stinson said.
“We’re growing at about four per cent a year which is the fastest per capita in the province,” Stinson said. “Other districts may get more students a year but on a percentage growth, based on student population, it’s not as rapid as ours.”
The Sooke school district has about 11,300 students and 1,600 staff.
This year, as part of a new information technology plan, the Sooke district’s approximately 700 teachers will be getting laptops, leased on a three-year basis, to better plan and prepare their lessons and track student demographics and attendance, Stinson said.
As part of its growth, the district is also planning for a new middle school and a new elementary school in west Langford and the expansion of Royal Bay Secondary School “is well underway and on schedule to open next September.” The naming process for the new schools will take place next year.
Saanich School Superintendent Dave Eberwein says he’s expecting about another 30 students in the district with added registrations in June.
“It’s always interesting to see who walks through the door the first week in September,” Eberwein said. “We had a bit of an uptick on registration over the summer — a little bit more than what we were anticipating. It’s always a bit of a guessing game, who is going to move into the community.”
“We’ve seen a slight increase in our projection which is a good problem to have and we’ve found homes for everybody and everybody has a place to go to today,” Eberwein said.
There’s a lot of changes in the Saanich school district with the opening of Keating Elementary after it’s seismic upgrade and expansion, he said.
“It’s a beautiful new addition to the school,” he said. “There’s lots of newness. It’s like opening a new present every year.”
There’s also lots of planning underway with the final year of the implementation ofthe new curriculum for Grades 11 and 12, he said.
The Saanich school district expects around 7,300 students this year and more than 1,000 staff, Eberwein said.
Greater Victoria School District superintendent Shelley Green said she, too, is waiting to see how many students show up to school this week.
It’s the largest school district of the three in the capital region with about 20,000 students and 3,600 staff.
“We are confident we’re ready in all our schools this year with enough teachers and enough classrooms,” Green said.
“Of course we’ll do the first week and see who exactly shows up,” Green said. “That’s always an important time for us and that begins today. We’ll look if schools got more students or fewer than they were expecting. But we’re confident it will all work out this year.”
That said, two overflow classrooms at the nearby Artemis Place “are not quite ready yet” for Lansdowne Middle School students as expected this week, Green said.
In the meantime, a multipurpose room and learning support room in Landsdowne will be used for the two weeks “while that job is completed” at Artemis, she said.
“We’re so excited to have all our teachers and parents and students return to school,” Green said. “Our buildings are in excellent shape and we’re really looking forward to the start of the school year.”
All three superintendents are asking drivers to take extra precautions this week as students return to school and adjust to the early-morning schedule and traffic.
“Pay huge attention to those school zones,” Green said. “We’ll have excited little pumpkins going back to school so a reminder to our drivers to be extra cautious.”
