The Garden Valley School Division (GVSD) held the first of three public meetings Tuesday night to share a recommendation for new school catchments that will come as a result of the opening of Pine Ridge Elementary School in the fall of 2019.

The recommendation presented involved a couple of key areas.  It involved changing the grade configurations at J.R. Walkof School from a K-4 to a K-3 school and moving the grade 4 students from J.R. to Emerado Centennial School. 

"That helps to equalize the numbers of those two schools," said Assistant Superintendent of Programs and Curriculum, Todd Monster.  "So as we draw down the numbers at J.R. Walkof, it doesn't negatively impact the student numbers at Emerado School."

Other parts of the recommendation would see children living in the Pine Ridge development, Red Hawk, Gemstone and Rosebrook areas of Winkler attending Pine Ridge School.  "Knowing that down the road as new students come in, it may involve moving new students into Winkler Elementary School which may have more room at that point in time," explained Monster.

For families living in Reinfeld, students from the village east of Winkler that already attend Parkland Elementary School, they would continue to go to Parkland.  For Reinfeld families currently attending Winkler Elementary, Emerado, or J.R. Walkof, Monster says there are two options they can be looking at. "One is having about 100 students attend Southwood and Prairie Dale Schools in Schanzenfeld, and the remainder of those students would then go to Pine Ridge Elementary."

Monster said there's a couple of key pieces that are all connected together from the recommendation that at the end of the day would allow Pine Ridge Elementary to start with a strong enrolment number, but have plenty of room for future growth. 

"It would leave Winkler Elementary School with lots of room to accommodate future growth, and the remaining schools in Winkler would be pretty well close to capacity with a little bit of room for growth."  Further to that, Monster says it would alleviate the overcrowding that currently exists at Parkland Elementary and J.R. Walkof and allow the division to remove a lot of the detached portable classrooms that currently exist at those two schools.

Three other options were looked at, and Monster said all of them had different implications that would have impacts either on students, busing, or the fact that they wouldn't have alleviated the overcrowding in some of the schools.  Monster says the implications would also result in declining enrolment at some of the schools.

It was also recommended Pine Ridge Elementary School would act as a feeder school for Northlands Parkway Collegiate.

Monster says, as for the board's next step in the process, they will continue to gather feedback from the public.

The information presented at Tuesday's meeting can be found on the Garden Valley School Division website, and well as the forms for people to provide feedback.  Feedback will be accepted until May 4th, which will give the board the opportunity to review the feedback at their May 8th board meeting in time for final preparations in June.

There are still two public consultations to be held where the recommendation will be shared.  The next presentation will be Thursday, April 19 @ 7:00 pm at Emerado Centennial School gym - for families who currently attend JR Walkof or Emerado Centennial School.  The third and final meeting will be on Tuesday, April 24 @ 7:00 pm at the GVC Zone (736 Main St., Winkler) - this meeting will be presented in High German.

Monster was asked about the option of school of choice, and had the following to say.

Meanwhile, parent Deana Wilson said she thought the board took a lot of consideration into making the decisions that they've made and said it all makes logical sense.  

However, Wilson is among a number of other parents that would like to see Pine Ridge be a feeder school for Garden Valley Collegiate instead of Northlands Parkway.  "It's a big one for our area (Pine Ridge), said Wilson.  A lot of us moved to that area so our kids could be geographically close to their schools.  Our kids already go to Parkland, and we would love for them to go to GVC, because they could bike there, they could walk there."

"I appreciate the effort that the administration put into coming up with the recommendation," said Rob Unruh, another parent in attendance. 

"Their research was very thorough and I think they respected the needs of the community, and I think it was important for them to keep kids and families together, so we certainly appreciate that."

Unruh said he does feel some more thought needs to be put into the high school catchments, specifically in relation to Pine Ridge feeding into NPC. "I wish that that was readdressed, but apart from that recommendation, I think the right decision was made."

Download the presentation here.