The Rainy River District School Board took the next step in closing three local schools Tuesday night after approving $3.6 million for the renovation and expansion of J.W. Walker here.
Trustees approved the expenditure at the board’s regular monthly meeting here.
Of the $3.6 million, an estimated $3.1 million will go to construction and $150,000 for furnishing costs at J.W. Walker. The board also approved hiring Prairie Architects at a cost of $256,750, plus GST.
Trustee Dan Belluz explained the building committee talked about a number of issues around the expansion, including where students would go while J.W. Walker was being renovated.
Construction is set to run from March, 2003 to June, 2004, with staff moving back in over the summer. He said they have talked to the architect to see if they could work around students at Walker until the end of the school year.
So far, the committee said students attending J.W. Walker will be sent to Sixth Street School for the duration of construction, with Sixth Street students being moved to Robert Moore School for the 2003-04 school year.
“We had representatives from all the schools, school councils, and staff. We included teachers so they can talk about technical glitches that we might not realize would happen if you, say, moved a certain room,” Superintendent of Education Terry Ellwood said.
With reps from all the schools that will be closing, Ellwood felt it was a positive process. “We’re starting to build some bridges there,” he remarked.
Belluz noted the committee also discussed traffic issues around J.W. Walker, such as the road leading to Fort Frances High School, but it hadn’t come up with any solutions as of yet.
In addition to the expansion, the board Tuesday night approved $456,810 to upgrade the heating and air exchange system from electricity to natural gas, and awarded Heikki Lampi Sand and Gravel the contract for building a new parking lot at Fort High.
Meanwhile, when the board reviewed the personnel report, which included six leave requests, four resignations, and four retirements of teachers and educational assistants, trustees asked if the board would experience a teacher shortage next year.
“We are seeing for the first time a little more movement in staff,” Education Director Warren Hoshizaki replied.
As a result of this movement, the board anticipated hiring up to 12 new teachers this year alone.
“Every year we’re looking at 12 hirings. We definitely don’t have a surplus,” he said.
Still, Hoshizaki wasn’t worried about a shortage in finding qualified teachers to fill those positions. He said the board has gone to the Lakehead symposium and Winnipeg to recruit—and some of those contacts already are paying off.
Also Tuesday night, the board heard a presentation from the head librarian at the Fort Frances Public Library.
Margaret Sedgwick highlighted some of the ways the library works with schools to improve literacy, including that they prepare and loan groups of books to individual classes and school libraries.
“We spend about $10,000 a year on curriculum-support materials for school programs,” she noted.
Sedgwick asked that the board consider striking a committee to see how the library could further work with schools to improve literacy.
Also concerned about possibly losing free Internet access the library already has, Sedgwick asked if the board would consider hooking it up to the high-speed wireless system now available at all public schools.
“We’ve already contacted our tech department and they are looking at a couple of things with high-speed Internet,” Hoshizaki told the board.
He added they also are looking at linking the library with the school board’s internal network so every teacher would have access to library information.
Featured
Fort Frances Times
Local News from Across the Rainy River District
