Falconridge May get New Elementary School

BY LUISA D’AMATO, RECORD STAFF

WATERLOO — Lexington Public School needs a $4.2-million expansion and facelift, including a 13-classroom addition, renovation and a new roof for the gym, and air conditioning for the school, a report to school board trustees says.

The report also recommends building a brand-new elementary school on Falconridge Drive by 2014 in a fast growing area of new homes — with 825 still to be built — around Kiwanis Park.

Trustees received the report Monday, but won’t vote on it until June.

The report was written by an accommodation review committee studying the schools in the eastern part of Kitchener and Waterloo, including Bridgeport, Elizabeth Ziegler, Lexington, Margaret Avenue, Prueter and Suddaby public schools.

An accommodation review committee is a group of parents, principals, staff and city officials who study shifting population trends in a certain area and make recommendations about closing schools, building new ones or changing boundaries.

The schools in the eastern part of Kitchener-Waterloo have room for 2,866 students with the schools that are already there, plus 325 more with the proposed new school on Falconridge Drive, for a total of 3,191 spaces.

There are only 2,429 students attending those schools. Even after population growth on the edge of the city is accounted for, there will only be 2,666 elementary students in 2015, staff predict.

But board planner Lauren Manske said the committee decided not to recommend closing any schools in the area.

“What it came down to is that there was a lot of support for community-level schools,” she said.

“Even if they are underutilized, if you were to take out any of those facilities, you’re abandoning the population in and around any one location.”

Lexington Public School was closed for a time, and reopened in 1993 with a temporary extra wing with the idea that it might close again 15 to 20 years later, after the population started to age.

The committee is recommending a permanent addition with 10 classrooms and three kindergarten rooms, renovations for the gym, and air conditioning. The renovations would be complete by 2012.

“There was very strong support to maintain a community school in the Lexington neighbourhood,” the report said.

As for the school on Falconridge Drive, it would be for junior kindergarten to Grade 6, the report said.

The committee felt it was important that as many students as possible have a school they can walk to. Because of the “relative isolation” of the community around Falconridge Drive, this isn’t possible for the children in that neighbourhood with the existing schools.

The committee also recommended that a small group of children who attend Elizabeth Ziegler School and then go on to Margaret Avenue Public School for Grade 7 and 8 instead be directed to MacGregor Public School for those grades.

This is because these few students lose almost all contact with their classmates from Elizabeth Ziegler for the two years of Grade 7 and 8. Then, most will rejoin their old friends again in Grade 9 at Kitchener-Waterloo Collegiate and Vocational School.

Allowing the students — there were only three in this position this year — to attend MacGregor with all their friends “will add a little bit of stability for these kids,” said Manske.

To read the full report, go to the public school board’s website at wrdsb.ca and click “About,” then “Board meetings” then “Meeting agendas” and then “Committee of the Whole agenda, May 10.” The report is in the agenda.