School replacement plans on the mind of SD52 this year

The prospect of a pair of new schools for the District and a review of a recent Hold and Secure incident at Charles Hays Secondary School provided for a fair bit of the attention of the School District 52 Board at their most recent meeting of September 15th

The aging nature of two of the schools in the city was one item of interest presented at the first meeting of the new school year, a topic which will see School District 52 officials forwarding some school replacement cost estimates to the provincial government in the near future. 

The notes on potential school replacement were part of School District 52's listing of capital budget projections that were approved at their September 15th Board Meeting.

In total, four items made up the Capital budget notices for the Ministry of Education's reviews, among them:

A 24 million dollar estimate for the replacement of Prince Rupert Middle School.

An 11 million dollar estimate for the replacement of Conrad School.

Three million, eight hundred thousand dollars is the estimate for the School District's Board Office consolidation plan.

While the cost of replacing the School bus fleet for the city has been estimated at one hundred thousand dollars.

Prince Rupert Middle School

Conrad Street Elementary School

On other business, the School District also addressed the recent Hold and Secure situation at Charles Hays Secondary, noting some of their observations related to the September 11th incident.

Noting that the Hold and Secure protocol was implemented owing to a threat from outside of the school, with a student having approached a school counsellor about a person outside of the school environment. The Hold and Secure process was implemented while the RCMP located the person  of interest, with the School District noting that at no time were any students in the school considered in any danger.

The School and district staff will review their implementation of the protocol to allow for staff to identify any areas for improvement that could be put in place for future events.

School District officials also reviewed some of the new curriculum timeline for SD52 with Superintendent Sandra Jones providing some background on the process ahead for staff, students and parents.

As well, the School District Board approved 4 draft policies to be reviewed by partner groups for further comment, those policy reviews included:

Field Trip policy, Emergency Preparedness Policy, Volunteers Policy, Whistleblower Policy

The Board also approved 3 policies to replace existing guidelines for the District, among those changes are the Conflict of Interest policy, Trustee Remuneration and Expense Allowance Policy and Travel and Subsistence Allowance Policy.

The School District Board also removed one policy, the School Planning Councils Policy which is no longer a requirement of the School Act.

The Board also was provided a review of events at Camp Jupiter this summer, as the district's Occupational Therapist Sue Neilson outlined the nature of the program and the reception of it from students, parents and sponsors in the community.

The overview of the September 15th meeting can be found here.

For more items related to education on the North Coast see our archive page here.