The Okotoks area is getting two new schools.
Alberta Education announced on Oct. 8 a new K-9 school for the Foothills School Division for between 500 and 700 students somewhere in the Okotoks area. As well a Francophone school will be built to replace école Beausoleil, a K-9 school located near the Okotoks Recreation Centre.
Foothills School Division superintendent of schools John Bailey said it was welcome news.
“We have been in conversations about our need for a K-6 school or a K-9,” Bailey said. “What this basically means is they have given us approval to start the planning process with them to build a new K-9 school for Okotoks.”
The announcement is like just getting assigned a term paper — there’s plenty of work and studying to be done. The division doesn’t know the cost or the location for the announced school.
“We don’t know for sure where it is going to go,” Bailey said. “One of the challenges is Okotoks has no land available with town boundaries. It will be for Okotoks, but we don’t know where it is going to be.”
Bailey said the division’s next step is to find land, possibly just outside of Okotoks.
“We need something like six to eight acres,” he said.
He is hoping the doors would open on the proposed school within two to three years.
“It’s great news and we are excited about it but it’s not like it is going to open this fall,” Bailey said. “When it opens it will take pressure off our schools in Okotoks.
“Westmount is the most full, but the other two (Big Rock and Dr. Morris Gibson) are quite full as well.”
He said the division still plans to have public consultation for potential boundary changes in 2015-16 to alleviate pressure at Okotoks schools, particularly Westmount which opened in the fall of 2012, that has more than 800 students.
There is land designated near Air Ranch for the proposed 350 student Francophone school to replace école Beausoleil.
“Parents and students from Beausoleil will have their new school will all the amenities, like a gymnasium, library, gathering area that a school should have,” said Anne-Marie Boucher, Southern Francophone Education Division chairwoman. “We are confident that this new school will lead to a growth in student enrolment for école Beausoleil.”
The proposed schools are two of 55 new schools for the province as well as 20 modernization projects announced by Alberta Education on Oct. 8.
The designated land in Air Ranch is not big enough to accommodate a school for the Foothills School Division.
Highwood MLA Danielle Smith said the proposed schools in the Okotoks area is good news.
“The K-9 school being proposed is absolutely essential for the Foothills School Division,” Smith said. “I recognize there is still a challenge in being able to find a school site, but from what I understand from the school division and the MD of Foothills they will be doing some consultation on a range of options.”
She said potential sites include some within the 33 quarter-sections of land the Town of Okotoks has applied to annex from the MD.
“I understand there are other options,” Smith said. “In the past school boards have opted for outside Okotoks proper, with Christ the Redeemer and Holy Trinity Academy for example.
She said one potential site is in the Aldersyde site.
Smith said she will champion whatever decisions are made by the division, local municipalities and residents.
Although delighted by the news, Smith, the leader of the opposition Wildrose party, found the timing of the announcement intriguing.
“This is politics – this is entirely an announcement for the PCs to curry favour because they are in the middle of four byelections,” Smith said. “But it doesn’t take away from the fact the schools are needed.
“You can be assured that I will be pressing to make sure that the province actually delivers. The sad part is we have seen so many announcements with very little progress.”
The Wildrose party announced in early October it would commit $2-billion over the next four years into new schools, modernization and maintenance.
“We have to recognize that if we (Alberta) are going to be doubling in population, these kind of school announcements have to be built into a regular, annual on-going long-term plan in order to keep up with growth,” Smith said.
