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HomeMy WebLinkAboutHuron Expositor, 2002-10-23, Page 7In brief Brussels Grey have mixed responses to school board While Brussels Public School council chair Mary Jean Bell says it's "too early to get too excited yet," about possible school closures, Grey Central Public School council chair Marie Blake says she's hoping to build a strong case for her school based on its outdoor learning centre. Both schools have been named for possible closure by the Avon Maitland District School Board in a recent director's action report naming 19 elementary schools along with Seaforth District High School for possible closure. "I'm proud of what we have at Grey. We've done a lot of work here to build an outdoor classroom with ponds, a bush, butterfly gardens, a beaver trail and bird houses all around. And, we've proposed to make it more profitable," says Blake. She says Grey Central is looking for volunteers to spearhead a project to offer the school's environmental education to students outside the district with college students teaching the program. "We're still in the idea stage ,but we could offer so much here," she says. Blake says she's concerned about the possble closure of Grey when, with an enrolment of 230 students, the school has a capacity of 83 per cent. "We actually have a lot of Catholics going to this school because they felt it was too far to bus their kids to a Catholic school. But, if they're going to be bused further by the Avon Maitland board, parents will certainly be looking at the Catholic schools again," she says. While Blake says she doesn't believe in sacrificing quality education for the sake of a building, she adds that Grey is a beautiful school that's worth fighting for. "Some people don't believe there's any threat but I think they're going into it naively if they think that," she says. Blake also questions the logic of busing more students further when the board's transportation budget cannot meet its costs now. Bp Susan Hundertmark -1111111=211111- Students take part in speocial service... Po9.3 HOMES on • P09. 6 Remembrance Octy ... Page S, 5 and 12 November 14, 2001 Si (includes GST) DAVE DEIGHTON Travel Planner Imperial Palace, Circus Circus or Stardust Nov. 25 - 4 NIGHTS 6398 p.p. dbl. Air and Hotel!! 1 I ,: .411 Ott TPI TRAVEL SEAFORTH orlanplisperarion /04671665 Weal I6NLS . M WW1,,OM4' 43Main St., 527-2062 Email: tpic4th@tcc.on.ca Storytime with Franklin... Franklin, a popular children s story character, made an appearance at Walton Little School s grand opening event at the former Walton Public School on Saturday. Toy and book fairs made up part of the event for the facility that centres on early literacy for young children. Scott Hilgendorff photo Service remembers Mistie By Laura Czekaj The Stratford Beacon Herald Family and friends remembered Mistie Murray, who disappeared from Goderich in May .1995 at the age of 16, as full of life;'` happy and vibrant during a mass celebrating her life Saturday. "We miss the birthdays and the happy Christmases, all that left when Mistie left," said Mistie's older brother Dean, his voice breaking with emotion, at the ceremony in Stratford. "Since she went away there has been a huge vacuum in our lives and a whole lot of emptiness." The mass, held at St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church on Huron Street in Stratford, was seen by many as the final leg in the family's more than six-year journey to find Mistie, who went missing from the Goderich area in 1995 at the age of 16. Police charged Mistie's father with her murder, saying he dumped her body in Lake Huron but a body never surfaced and Steve Murray was acquitted in less than 45 minutes. An audit by an outside police force, the York Region police, was supported by a civilian commission that oversees police. The audit was highly critical of the police involved and found that officers investigating the See SEARCH, Page 2 Survey finding students will go to Catholic system By Susan Hundertmark Expositor Staff While the Seaforth Public School council has only received 15 responses, replies so far to a survey of parents show that students may be pulled from the public system in favour of the Catholic system if Seaforth District High School closes and elementary students are moved to the high school facility. "We've been surprised at the number so far who've said they'll leave the public system," says Lisa Campbell, chair of the SPS council. Because SPS is under review for program changes and SDHS is under review for potential closure, Seaforth parents have been asked to fill out a survey to help both school councils prepare reports to be presented to the Avon Maitland District School Board's special meetings on Nov. 26 or 28. The survey asks parents if they're in favour of SPS remaining at its current location, of SDHS remaining open, of Grades 7 and 8 attending the high school, and of the portables being removed from SPS. It also asks if parents wish more information about Grades 7 and 8 functioning within a high school setting. As well, if SDHS does close, parents are asked to indicate where they would send their children to high school and are given the choices of the public high schools in Wingham, Mitchell, Exeter and Clinton, the Catholic high schools in Clinton or Stratford and homeschooling. The final question asks if parents would be open to attending a private school in Seaforth if it were established. Campbell says 35 to 40 students have left Seaforth Public School for a Catholic elementary school during the past three years but has not yet researched the answer to why they left. "The bard does not feel they'd ldse a significant number to the Catholic system if they close Seaforth schools but I think that's a grave error in judgement," she says. The board's c9mmunications officer Steve Howe says the Avon Maitland district only lost 10 students to the Catholic system during the last round of school closures last year. He adds that no numbers have been gathered looking at students who have left public schools in the Seaforth area for the Catholic system but disputes that 35-40 have left the public school. "The enrolment projection numbers of the past several years would have been affected grotesquely if that were true and they haven't," he says. Campbell says that at last week's meeting with board See PRIVATE, Page 2 Infants learrnng to speak with sign language Signing helps babies communicate without speaking United States by early childhood development researcher Joseph Garcia in the late 1980s, the program teaches hearing parents of hearing babies how to communicate earlier than usual with their babies using sign language. While Horan offered the workshop the first time in Seaforth last month, she says' there was a lot of confusion around the idea that hearing babies could use sign language. "There are great benefits to teaching pre- verbal babies sign language. Parents often look at their babies deep in thought and wonder what's going on in those little heads - this is a way to begin finding out," she says. "We teach babies to wave bye-bye, to play patty -cake and to throw kisses and then we stop. But we can make sign language so much more useful with hearing kids," she says. Because Claire now knows three signs - milk, more and eat - Lorianne says she's more able to understand what's going on during Claire's recent bout of teething. When Claire wakes in the middle of the night, Lorianne is more able to understand her baby's needs. "She signed milk to me at 5 a.m. so I was able to get her a little drink and we could all get back to sleep," she says. "I want to teach her the sign for hurt next so she can tell me where it hurts when she does," says Lorianne. Research into signing for hearing children See SIGNING, Pogo 2 By Susan Hundertmark Expositor Staff At just 10 months of age, Claire Horan, of RR 4 Walton, can tell her mom when she wants milk. She's not speaking a year earlier than most babies. But, by making a gesture that looks like someone milking a cow with one hand, she's learned the American Sign Langugage sign for milk and can now communicate when she wants a drink. "If you start using sign language with your babies around six months, they can be signing hack to you around eight months. I'm doing it with my baby and nothing makes her happier than being able to be understood," says Claire's mother, Lorianne Horan. Horan, a trained sign language interpretor, who's been working for the Avon Maitland District School Board for six years before a recent maternity leave, is now teaching a new program she discovered that allows parents to communicate with their pre -verbal babies. She found the Sign With Your Baby system while surfing the internet during her maternity leave and has become one of only two sign language teachers -the other is in Alberta - to offer the program in Canada. Called Little Hands Sign Language, the workshop is being held Nov. 27 at Seaforth Community Hospital. Developed in the Susan Hundertmork photo Two-year-old Emma Horan makes the sign for alligator while her mom lorianne, a trained sign language interpretor, holds her favourite alligator puppet. Horan is offering a course to parents about how to sign with their babies.