School closures ripple through communities
Schools have long been considered more than just learning institutions — they’re also where fundraisers and Christmas pageants take place, and where children and their parents meet lifelong friends.
But when a school closes its doors, it’s a loss not only to those with a direct connection to the school, but also to the neighbourhood’s residents.
For more than 20 years, Gary Williamson grew accustomed to the chatter of schoolchildren, the long lines of school buses and cars pulling into the street, and the after-school activity that swirled about Eugene Coste Elementary across from his house.
But last year, after the Calgary Board of Education closed the Haysboro-area school, all of that chatter, activity and energy disappeared. An empty shell remains, surrounded in the summertime by an untended lawn full of dandelions.
“There was a lot of life in that area,” said Williamson, currently the president of the Haysboro Community Association. “Now it’s pretty dead.”
Schools, particularly elementary schools, have long been considered more than just learning institutions — they’re also where casino fundraisers and Christmas pageants take place, where community functions are held, and where children and their parents meet lifelong friends.
They bring vibrancy to a neighbourhood. So when a school closes its doors, it’s a loss not only to those with a direct connection to the school, but also to the neighbourhood’s residents.
“I’ve always liked the school there. There’s energy. Parents are there; children are there. There are activities happening,” Williamson said, adding that his children didn’t attend the school.
“I hope they do something positive with it. I’d rather have something going on than just an empty, darkened building. Vacant buildings do not add to your community.”
Since 2000, the Calgary Board of Education has closed 30 schools — many of which were leased to charter schools — and has opened 27 new ones.
In that same time frame, the Calgary Catholic School District closed one school and opened 20 new ones.
Of the shuttered schools, most were in older established neighbourhoods, while the newest schools, for the most part, were built in newer areas on the edge of the city.
It’s never easy to close a school and each decision is carefully considered, said Frank Coppinger, superintendent of facilities and environmental services with the Calgary Board of Education.
“We have a joint use agreement between the city and the school board and any decisions that can impact a community are looked at very closely,” he said.
The main motivation for closing a school is ensuring that students have a comprehensive academic program, he said, adding some schools are closed and students are consolidated into a new school so that these programs can be delivered.
Financial components and provincial funding also factor into those decisions, he said.
Coppinger also assured that an intensive review including community consultation is always undertaken before any school closing decision is made.
Some closed schools are leased to charter schools, sold to the francophone school board, demolished or stand vacant until school-age populations in those areas are back on the rise.
“Eugene Coste School is an example. There is no intention to sell or demolish or give it an alternative use,” he said. “We do see in the future the student growth in that community growing.”
But no matter what happens to the building in the end, Coppinger acknowledged that the loss of a school is a blow to the community.
It’s a loss of a meeting place and can be more taxing for parents and children, who may have to spend more travel time getting to and from their new schools, he said.
For Marilyn Wannamaker, the closing of Montgomery Junior High was so much more than just added travel time. It was seeing her daughter losing a network of friends.
Her daughter started Grade 7 last school year, and had to transfer to F.E. Osborne Junior High after Montgomery Junior High in northwest Calgary closed at the end of the 2010-11 school year.
F.E. Osborne “is a really good school with really good teachers. But it’s been a real loss for the kids from the neighbourhood school, trying to integrate into the new school and going there wounded, going there from a place of loss,” Wannamaker said.
Parents are once again bracing for another fight now that the Montgomery community’s elementary school, Terrace Road, is in danger of being shuttered, she said.
“The elementary is really the heart of the community. Kids come and go at junior high, but an elementary is where parents get to know each other and hang out,” she said.
“It would be an incredible loss to the community, getting to know neighbours, connecting with each other, walking and using the playground, all of those things would be lost.”
Stephanie Felker knows all too well the kind of uphill battle those parents are facing.
The mother of three was part of a committee who fought hard — and won — to keep St. Angela Elementary in Bridgeland open.
She credited the group for their painstaking efforts to attend board meetings, rally residents and come up with an alternative option to draw new students by turning the school into a workplace elementary, which supports parents who work downtown and offers a before- and afterschool program to match parents’ work schedules.
It’s an option that the board ultimately accepted.
Losing the school would have been like losing friends and family, she said.
“I have so many friends that have become good friends because they’re parents of children that my child goes to school with. You create connections. It’s more important than you can imagine,” she said.
Speaking as the president of the Bridgeland-riverside Community Association, Felker said it’s hard to attract families into neighbourhoods where there aren’t any schools.
“We want long-term residents that care about the community and are going to help build the community,” she said.
Gary Weikum, an instructor of urban planning at the University of Lethbridge, says it’s easy to blame school boards when schools close.
But in some ways, local school districts are “handcuffed” by provincial policy because school closings and openings are largely affected by government and provincial funding.
He suggested the province co-ordinate its educational funding with other services delivered by the province or by the community, such as recreation or library facilities. That way, when student enrolment starts to drop, that particular school can be used for other purposes until enrolment starts to rise again.
“Neighbourhoods go through life cycles. The children leave, their parents become empty nesters. Later on in the cycle, there is a rise in the number of children coming in again,” he said.
“In the meantime, you could have originally built a school in a manner that perhaps part of the school or all of the school is used for something other than school purposes.”
He cited examples of schools that are connected to a recreation centre, a library or even stores, to fulfil a multi-use purpose — a more sustainable approach to the construction of new schools.
Those are things that the Calgary Board of Education may consider in the future, Coppinger said.
“Hopefully we can make combined uses of schools in new school designs.”