A rural community northeast of Calgary, near the Saskatchewan border, is fighting to save its school as the local school division considers shuttering the sparsely attended place of learning.
In the 2016-2017 school year, enrollment at New Brigden School was a mere two students, both in the third grade, but residents of the hamlet say the drop in attendance was an anomaly. The school, which has taught students from Grade 1 through Grade 9, welcomed 17 students the previous year.
According to local families, several parents removed their children from the school following disputes with two staff members. The displaced students were enrolled at the school in Oyen, nearly 50 kilometres south of the hamlet, and a number of parents have elected not to switch back to New Brigden despite the fact the source of their contention, the two workers, are no longer employed at the local school.
One of the employees in question had her teaching license revoked as a result of the investigation into the allegations of the parents.
Officials with the Prairie Rose School Division have listed New Brigden School as a potential candidate for closure and the school board will host an open house on March 20 to discuss the school’s future with residents of the hamlet and its surrounding area.
Residents say the school body is set to drastically grow as the hamlet, located along Highway 41, is ripe with young families and there are currently four kindergarten and six pre-kindergarten students attending privately-funded programs at the school. Some parents predict the school could have 25 elementary students by 2020.
“We have a very awesome, young community of people that work hard to be involved in the community,” said Savanna Tye, a local mother. “They all pitch in anytime there's an event, anytime there’s anything that needs to be done. We've got so many young people with little kids waiting to use this school it'd be a crying shame if we lost it now.”
Many of the roughly 100 people who live in New Brigden attended the school themselves and hope their children will experience the same advantages of small class sizes in a school that embraces community spirit.
“This is one of the big organs of this community,” said Simone Hagens, whose seven-year-old daughter Eva is one of the school’s two enrolled students. “You’ve got your community hall, your curling rink and your school.”
“Your school is your heart.”
Parents are concerned their children, as young as five years old, will be subjected to hour-long bus rides to Oyen where there is a potential for overcrowded classrooms.
Members of the community, including Ashley Jorgenson, say they will do what they can to help keep the doors of New Brigden School open.
“We’ll fundraise for building maintenance,” said Jorgenson. “We’ll do the snowplowing ourselves.”
“We’ll do whatever we can.”
Prairie Rose School Division is expected to make its final decision on the future of New Brigden School on Tuesday, April 11.
With files from CTV’s Alesia Fieldberg
