Photo from PWSD

By Curtis Galbraith

Local Schools

Replacing Harry Balfour, PWA top priorities for PWSD

Apr 1, 2019 | 2:33 PM

The Peace Wapiti School Division says it has two urgent needs in its new capital plan.

The top two items on the wish list are replacements for Harry Balfour and Peace Wapiti Academy.

Superintendent Bob Stewart says half the students that were at Harry Balfour have moved to the new Whispering Ridge school and the goal now is to move the rest outside of city limits.

“The recent announcement of the County of Grande Prairie securing MSR (municipal school reserve) land near the Five Mile Hall is a vital first step in the process to secure a new school. The Board continues to lobby Alberta Education and the MLAs for approval of a school announcement for that land and, if approved, it’s our hope that one of our capital plan projects is among the Government of Alberta’s next announcement of new school projects.”

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What can happen when will depend on funding from the province.

“Some people think that because we have land provided to us that we get a school. That’s just the important, vital first step. The second part to that is an announcement from Alberta Education and the government to say you now get a school,” adds Stewart.

He says replacing these two schools would also help resolve ongoing problems related to transportation.

“Reducing the excessive ride times, the early morning pick-up and late drop-off times for our rural students who are currently being bussed through the city and its busy central core.”

Stewart says Peace Wapiti Academy’s student population is growing beyond that building’s intended capacity. It is taking in kids from five feeder schools: Harry Balfour, Whispering Ridge, Bezanson, Clairmont, and Penson School in Grovedale.

The next two items on the list, identified as important rather than urgent, are a new Kindergarten to Grade 8 school in the Clairmont area and a moderization of Bonanza School.

The Division says the first one would relieve what it calls “enrollment pressure” at Clairmont Community School and Robert W. Zahara Public School in Sexsmith. It would also meet the needs of new residential neighbourhoods planned for that area.

Modernizing Bonanza School would, as stated in the PWSD newsletter, “see the facility continue to support the consistent enrolment experienced in past years.”