Last day of school

Dec 22, 2023 | 12:00 PM

Friday, December 22 marks the last day of school before the Christmas break.

Grande Prairie Public School Division superintendent Sandy McDonald says officials are “very grateful for the work our staff, our students, and our parents have done.”

“Our belief is that our students will succeed most when staff and students and parents are all working together for the same goal and that’s what we’re seeing across the school division.”

McDonald says attendance and everyone being able to be back at school is not where it was before COVID but says there are “some really optimistic signs for the future.”

McDonald says everyone deserves a break.

“We’ve got a program called KinderPAL (PAL stands for Play and Learn) that we put in place a couple of years ago that provides parents the opportunity to have their children in Kindergarten attend for full days.”

“Those Kindergarten students are just doing great work and they’re coming so far, so fast.

Half the day is spent with their teachers, half with an early learning instructor.

McDonald says a recent report on academic programming was “very, very positive” and that some of the sports teams have had good years.

by Curtis Galbraith