The Citizen, 2007-10-04, Page 1The CitizenVolume 23 No. 39 Thursday, Oct. 4, 2007 $1.25 ($1.18 + 7c GST)
Serving the communities of Blyth and Brussels and northern Huron County
Inside this week
Pg. 2
Pg. 3
Pg. 9
Pg. 10
Pg. 15
A Brussels ‘Citizen’
honoured
Recognition for
Blyth’s ‘Citizen’
OFA holds all-
candidates meeting
A salute to our
firefighters begins
Auburn man rides
cross-country
It will be a happy occasion indeed
for supporters of historic Ball’s
Bridge Oct. 13.
After seeing the popular tourist
attraction closed for many months,
the Friends of Ball’s Bridge have
announced its official re-opening to
light vehicular traffic, in time for the
fall colours.
Work has been done on the bridge,
including new railings installed this
week.
The county had closed the bridge
some time ago because of safety
concerns and the cost to bring it to
standards. The intent after
discussions was to close it
permanently.
After an outpouring of public
support for the scenic bridge, the
county ultimately reached a decision
in January to turn the bridge over to
the municipalities of Ashfield-
Colborne-Wawanosh and Central
Huron, along with a one-time
payment of $250,000 to assist in
repairs.
Several members of the Friends of
Ball’s Bridge had also met with
Huron-Bruce MPP Carol Mitchell in
August of 2006, to discuss how they
might be able to save the bridge.
The group got more good news
when in April of this year, the
province responded. The initiative
got aa boost with $242,000 from the
province’s Rural Infrastructure
Investment Initiative.
A ribbon-cutting will mark the
official opening at 2 p.m. Oct. 13.
Dignitaries expected will include
MPP Carol Mitchell, county warden
Deb Shewfelt and municipal
politicians.
Ball’s
Bridge
opens
for fall
Oct. 13
In step with fall
Though wagon rides were offered at the Wawanosh Nature Centre’s annual fall colour tour
this past Sunday, many visitors preferred to stroll the picturesque trails. The weather was
perfect with warm temperatures and sunny skies. From left: Becky Maldini, Skye Maldini,
Mackenzie Bell with Rob Maldini and Gary Bell holding Noah Maldini. (Vicky Bremner photo)
Seaforth
students
improve
Post-secondary education is
coming to Blyth via the internet.
And hopefully very soon.
After attending the grand opening
of the Bruce County Access Centre
in Tiverton on Sept. 20, North Huron
councillor Greg McClinchey tabled
the option of housing a centre in
Blyth at the Sept. 24 council meeting
and other councillors jumped at the
opportunity.
A community access centre, or as
McClinchey likes to call it, an E-
Learning Portal, is essentially a
computer lab, accessible to the
community, with video conference
capabilities conducive to post-
secondary education in an area
where traveling to a college or
university is largely unrealistic.
McClinchey suggested council
look into the possibility of placing a
centre, similar to the one in Tiverton,
where Blyth’s old library used to be.
This would make the centre the only
one in Huron County and one of just
six in southwestern Ontario.
McClinchey said he understands
that all the area has to do is provide
the space, and pay for power and
heat. The Ontario government will
take care of the rest. The area will be
furnished, supplied with computers
and equipment for
audioconferencing and
videoconferencing.
However, McClinchey is hoping to
go a little further with the idea, as he
has been talking with local
educational groups and several
Ontario colleges and universities
about outreach classes, which would
provide a more conventional
learning environment.
McClinchey says several schools
are equipped with the outreach
option, Humber College being one
of them, that could help an access
centre in Blyth become more like a
learning centre.
There are several reasons why this
plan can work and why it should be
in Blyth, McClinchey says.
In addition to being kilometres
from the geographical centre of the
county, Blyth is perfect for several
reasons. McClinchey thinks the
other site that jumps to mind is
Wingham, but that it might be too
close to Tiverton, putting the
application in jeopardy.
After talking to the people at
Contact North, the partner in this
project designated by the Ontario
government, McClinchey discovered
that the hardest part of getting this
project rolling, is finding someone
who will donate the space,
something the municipality has
bypassed.
“I think there’s a case to be made
for the old library in Blyth,” he told
other councillors. “We’re already
paying for the heat and the lights.
So, if these are our only costs, we’re
already doing that.”
McClinchey added that the centre
won’t have to be a big space, citing
the centre in Tiverton, saying that the
space is utilized well.
The other challenge is being in an
area that would need a centre like
this, which Huron County is.
“If we can bring post-secondary
education into North Huron, then
people in Huron County won’t have
to go so far away. We’re one of the
few counties in southwestern
Ontario that doesn’t have easy, ready
access to post-secondary education,”
he said.
“And it’s not just the living costs, a
lot of people in the area don’t have
computers or they don’t have high
speed internet. We’re shooting for
the stars here and hopefully we still
land pretty high.”
McClinchey says he has high
hopes that this centre won’t just
cater to young college kids, but that
it will also appeal to older people
who want to pursue a degree or a
diploma, but don’t necessarily have
the time to attend a full-time school
program right now.
“Careers now are life-long
learning experiences. I’ll use myself
as an example. I have a job, a child,
a wife, a family, a house, all of those
things, so physically going back to
school to obtain a degree is a little
unrealistic for me at this juncture,”
he said.
“However, if I come home from
work at night, have supper with my
family, put my little girl to bed and
then head up to the access centre and
spend three or four hours working on
a degree program, I can do that. I
can pull that off.”
After a motion was passed by
councillors to explore this
Approximately 500 educators have
attended tours and professional
development sessions at Seaforth
Public School as part of the
provincial government’s
“Turnaround” initiative for “low-
performing” schools.
And, although versions of the
program in some other districts had
little impact, the teachers and
administrators who went through
this particular site can be confident
they observed effective strategies:
student success improved
dramatically over the three-year
period at Seaforth Public.
“I guess the bad news is that you
were directed with this money
because you were a low-performing
school. And Seaforth had been a
low-performing school for about
four years,” explained principal Kim
Black at an Avon Maitland District
School Board meeting Tuesday,
Sept. 25.
She added, “only about one-third
of the students were achieving to
standard” in the provincewide tests
administered to Grade 3 and 6
students through the Education
Quality and Accountability Office
(EQAO).
Three years later, following the
input of one Education Ministry
teacher for exceptional students, one
“diagnostician” assessing the
practices of teachers, and one
Education Ministry principal
assessing Black’s work, the school’s
EQAO results have, indeed,
experienced a “turnaround.”
In 2004, 30 per cent of the school’s
students achieved the provincial
standard in reading, and the writing
success rate stood at 42 per cent.
Last year’s test results, released
recently, revealed 78 per cent of
Seaforth Public School’s students
now achieve the provincial standard
in reading, and 82 per cent meet the
standard in writing.
Education superintendent Pat
Stanley explained that 2007-08 is the
school’s “exit year” from the
Turnaround project. Stanley
described Turnaround as a
partnership between the school
board and education ministry that
Deadline
changes
The Citizen will be closing for
Thanksgiving Monday.
As a result, deadlines will be
moved ahead to Friday. Any
advertisements or editorial to be
included in the Oct. 11 issue must
be in the Brussels office by 2 p.m.
Friday, Oct. 5, or to the Blyth
office no later than 4 p.m. that day.
Access centre planned for Blyth
By Stew Slater
Special to The Citizen
Continued on page 8
By Shawn Loughlin
The Citizen
Continued on page 9