The Greater Essex County District School Board’s (GECDSB) decision to shift the French Immersion Program out of Forest Glade Public School was presented to parents for the first time Wednesday night.
Board officials presented their reasoning and plan to a crowd of about 20 at the former Eastwood Public School.
Last week, parents learned their students will have to attend Tecumseh Vista Academy this fall should they choose to continue in French Immersion.
According to the board, the decision was made due to lagging enrollment figures.
Following the meeting, parent Harmony Peach told CTV News the event did little to ease her concerns about the decision.
“I think that the COVID reality was downplayed, and wasn’t acknowledged as well as it could have been,” Peach said about enrolment.
Due to COVID-19 and online learning, Peach said one of her daughters was forced into the English stream. As a result, the mother of three will now have children at three different schools this fall.
“I understand that they’re going to provide us some dialogue with administration, but I don’t see how administration is going to solve our logistical problem of getting our three children to three separate locations, regardless of bussing or not,” she said.
Tecumseh Vista Academy exclusively offers French Immersion programming.
Peach criticized the board’s communication and “haste” in making this decision. Public consultations were not held and parents only learned of the decision and the meeting on Feb. 7.
“I mean, this is very abrupt. It feels like an ambush, and if this was such a well thought out and carefully laid plans, that it would seem to reason that those who are most impacted by it would have been given some heads up,” Peach said.
Figures presented by GECDSB indicated about 151 students were enrolled in Forest Glade’s FI program this year.
Kari Bryant, the GECDSB superintendent responsible for elementary school staffing, said enrollment is at about 50 per cent of what they had projected.
“So that program didn’t grow and become as robust as we would have liked,” Bryant told CTV News.
The board feared low enrolment could lead to Forest Glade merging multiple grades into one classroom.
In the event enrollment begins to increase rapidly, Bryant noted Tecumseh Vista will be able to accommodate growth.
“Vista has lots of space right now. So we do see that long term they will be able to accommodate. Even if French immersion swings back and becomes more popular, there is plenty of space in Vista to accommodate,” Bryant said.
Because all students will be beyond walking distance, Bryant said transportation will be made available.
When asked about the possibility of having students from the same household spread across the region, Bryant said that’s already the case for some families.
Students may not be the only members of school communities impacted as the future of teachers could be impacted by enrollment.
“So it’s hard for us to predict that, it depends on the number of students from Forest Glade that do make that move to Tecumseh Vista,” she said.
“Once we know those numbers and we’re able to factor in [Junior Kindergarten] registration and the new numbers at Tecumseh Vista in terms of [Junior Kindergarten] registration that determines our staffing numbers moving forward.”
Parents who wish to have their students continue French Immersion at Tecumseh Vista will be able to do so in the coming weeks and months ahead of the 2025-2026 school year.
