Parents of teens attending Oilfields High School are questioning the timing of a public school division’s pending decision whether to bring Grade 9 back to Millarville.
Eight parents sitting around tables at Oilfields High School in Black Diamond Sept. 24 found they had more questions than answers when discussing the positive and negative impacts of adding Grade 9 to the Foothills School Division’s K-8 Millarville Community School (MCS).
“They have to work in the context of all of the population of the area,” said parent Joel Den Haan. “I feel we could make a bunch of decisions, but with the ring road coming there’s going to be shifts in the way people commute and where they live. I’m not sure it’s the time to make a big change.”
Foothills School Division trustees passed a notice of motion in January to allow for the change to grade configuration to K-9 from K-8 following a request that came from the school council in May 2018. The board will make a decision at its Nov. 13 meeting.
At the Sept. 24 meeting, parents questioned the cost of the process, if the potential change would set a precedence for other small schools in the division, the need for a junior high school in High Country in the future, growth trends and projections in the region and if the board has considered removing Grades 7-8 from MCS.
Den Haan expressed concern about losing the additional Grade 9 teacher hired at Oilfields High School this year as a result of losing MCS Grade 9 students if the request is approved. He said he had a problem in past years when his daughter's class had 34 students at the K-6 Turner Valley School.
With the addition of a Grade 9 teacher this year, Den Haan said the difference is noticeable in terms of his daughter’s ability to get questions answered in class.
“If they reduced staff, I couldn’t support that,” he said.
Parents said positive impacts to the proposed change would affect MCS only.
For Oilfields, it could result in fewer students in option classes and athletics and larger class sizes with the potential of losing a teacher. They said it could also create a disconnect between the Millarville and Diamond Valley areas and MCS students could choose to attend high school somewhere other than Oilfields.
“We believe it’s a small impact on Oilfields School, but it might be bigger down the road,” said one parent.
Another parent stated the importance of empowering Millarville parents with the benefits of Oilfield High School to reduce fear-based decisions after parents at the Sept. 10 session in Millarville expressed concerns about students being exposed to things like drugs and vaping that they’re not exposed to in Millarville.
“Oilfields is a great school with a bad reputation,” one parent said.
About 70 parents attended the Millarville session, showing strong support for adding Grade 9 to the school and saying it will reduce anxiety around transitioning schools in the middle of the junior high years.
In 2011, the school board initiated public consultation for grade configuration at MCS, but kept it as is after reviewing data. However, the board agreed to reconsider grade configuration in the future if a request comes forward.
Millarville, originally a K-9 school, was reconfigured to K-8 in 1987 following a request from the community to move the Grade 9s to Oilfields for ease of transition, access to high school programming and crowding at MCS.
Chris Fuzessy, Foothills School Division superintendent of schools, said while the division didn’t have answers to many questions asked on Tuesday, it’s the board’s intention to discuss those, although he said they can’t speculate on things like the implications of the ring road.
“It was interesting to have the perspective of more questions than answers,” he said. “We will take into consideration the voices we heard from the first and second meetings, as well as online. We’ll map it out the next several weeks so the board can make decisions at that meeting.”
Fuzessy said he was happy with the turnout and encourages parents who were unable to attend the two meetings to provide their input on a survey at fsd38.ab.ca
“Any engagement is good,” he said. “The more voices the better.”
