The Richmond School District has denied an appeal by Burkville residents to use Sea Island elementary to create a “Burkeville bubble” this fall.
A group of Burkeville parents wrote to the school district asking that 58 students from their community be redirected from Brighouse elementary, which is currently at capacity with 500 students in 22 classes, to Sea Island elementary.
Sea Island elementary was closed in June 2019 because only 13 students were registered there.
The parents’ letter states a survey was conducted and found there are 58 students from kindergarten to Grade 7 living in Burkeville. They suggested creating three split-grade classes at Sea Island elementary thereby freeing up three classrooms at Brighouse elementary – calling it a “win-win situation” for both communities.
The letter garnered 31 signatures, 16 from parents and 15 from “community supporters.”
In a written response, district superintendent Scott Robinson said that senior staff spent “a significant amount of time” considering the parents’ request and discussed it with the Board of Education.
However, the district ultimately denied the request.
“Although it is recognized that ultimately this would result in smaller class groupings for the Burkeville residents, the same would not be true for the remaining students at Brighouse,” reads Robinson’s letter, a copy of which was obtained by the Richmond News.
“Your proposal requires three FTE teachers to be moved from Brighouse to Sea Island. Because of the number of students in each grade who would remain at Brighouse, there would not be an equivalent loss to teacher staffing at that school.”
Robinson added that either class sizes at Brighouse would grow larger due to the loss of teachers, or the district would need to add additional staff members. Other staff, such as resource or ELL support, might also need to be assigned to Sea Island.
“The district currently has multiple areas where it needs to redirect staffing due to the pandemic so unfortunately cannot add staffing to form a learning group at Sea Island.”
The district has also received similar requests from other parent groups, asking to use community centres or other facilities to decrease class sizes, according to Robinson’s response letter.
But those proposals carry the same concerns around extra staffing, and have not been approved, Robinson’s letter reads, “in the interests of taking an equitable approach for students across the district.”
Some classroom space has also been assigned to the Continuing Education program, which will likely return to in-class instruction sometime during the school year, according to Robinson’s letter.
- With files from Maria Rantanen
