Lakeshore Advance, 2013-05-01, Page 12Wednesday, May 1, 2013 • Lakeshore Advance 11
South Huron elementary area school numbers remain stable
Hilary Long
QMI Agency
Elementary schools in the Exeter area
will see stable enrolment Over the next 15
years, the Avon Maitland District School
Board trustees have learned.
Currently, 814 students are enrolled
between Exeter, South I luron grade 7 -B's,
Bluewater Coast and Stephen Central. That
number will remain steady, as will numbers
at each individual school over the next 15
years, with a total decline of Just three
students.
1lowever, the numbers are not as good for
the area's only high school, South Huron
District. Current student enrolment is 657
,tit by 2027 just 466 students will remain.
'Randy Wagler, chair of finance commit-
tee, said, "'Ihe bottom line is that by enlarge
elementary enrolment has stabilized, there
will be some minor ups and downs and
some regions have a little snore up but
nothing huge one way or the other."
"'That situation is not quite true for sec-
ondary, the large change we have seen in
our (decreased) elementary enrolment, we
will see that roll through the secondary over
then next 5 years. it means a 15 to 20 per
Ai
We believe that we have
been able to create a
sustainable infrastructure
for our school board going
forward,. We will continue
to monitor our enrolment
and there may be some
areas of the board where
we' have to make some
adjustments but not in the
immediate future."
cent drop in our secondary schools because
of that wave," he added.
Mike Ash, superintendent of education,
said, "We were not surprised by the projec-
tions but we were encouraged by the
elementary enrolment stabilizing. We had
anticipated the decline in our secondary,
and our decline locally is actually lower
than what is expected provincially.'1hat was
some good news for us"
Ile said many of the AMI)SB conunu►ni-
ties have already stabilized, the Mitchell
area in particular, he noted.
"Some communities will see a greater
decline in secondary than what we were
anticipating. It was a bit of a surprise to see
it On paper," said Ash. He pointed to South
I luron as the greatest area of concern.
"'That high school will be at a significant
decline over the next 5 to 10 years, to num-
bers in the 400-500 range from a school that
at one point had almost 900 students. It is a
significant change," he said.
Ash noted, "The encouraging thing about
the enrolment projections is that, through
our accommodation review process, we are
going to sustain good building utilization.
We have put the board in a good spot for
making effective use of the resources we
have, even though it has been a very diffi-
cult process for our communities to go
through."
"We believe that we have been able to
create a sustainable infrastructure for our
school board going forward,. We will con-
tinue to monitor our enrolment and there
may he some areas of the board where we
have to make some adjustments but not in
the immediate future," he said.
Ash said, for the board it means a slight
decrease in provincial funding. "We are
looking at a decline over the next 10 to 15
years in about 10 per cent of our secondary
enrolment, which is going to have an equal
decline in the budget for our secondary
schools. Elementary is not going to be as
great as that enrolment will stabilize," he
said.
"With the enrolment projections we now
have to start planning for what that finan-
cial impact will mean in terms of staffing
and programming for those schools," said
Ash.
Wagler noted that the enrolment projec-
tions have been update in full, using the
2011 Census data. "We use this information
to inform everything from planning, plan-
ning accommodation reviews, facilities
updates and so forth. This is really useful
information for the board."
Ile noted the planning area's have
changes slightly but dill not have a major
impact on individual school enrolment.
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