Monday August 19, 2024 | LANGFORD, BC [Updated August 20, 2024]
K-12 EDUCATION NEWS | by Mary P Brooke | Island Social Trends
The site for another Sooke School District (SD62) middle school in Langford at 2460 Gateway Road is across from land for a high school (announced in May 2024), off McCallum Road in the Costco shopping area.
On this cloudy Monday, local MLA Ravi Parmar (Langford-Juan de Fuca / Parliamentary Secretary for International Credentials) together with Sooke School District SD62 board chair Amanda Dowhy announced the new 7.2 acre land acquisition outdoors on the high school property, with the middle school land in sight across the road.
Today Parmar called the new middle school site “the final piece of the puzzle” so that “now they can get busy planning and making the case to government to build”.
Middle schools have students in Grades 6 to 8.
In school district lingo the area where the land is located is North Langford (north of Highway 1). This news comes after SD62 having dealt with a focus on south Langford over the past few years (including a new elementary school set to open on Latoria Road near neighbouring Colwood in September 2025).
There is already a new middle school in the Westhills area of Langford, called Centre Mountain Lellum which opened at 74% capacity in September 2022 and is now nearly full.
SD62 schools are located mostly in Langford, Colwood and Sooke, with also an elementary school in Metchosin and an elementary/middle school combo in Port Renfrew. It’s a large geographical footprint with a student population of about 13,065 expected in September 2024 (which includes about 350 more students over last year) and growing. Final enrollment numbers are available September 30 each year.
The population of Langford is growing consistently and rapidly. The City of Langford expects a population of 100,000 by 2050 (that will be double the current population in just 25 years). And for that the city’s official community plan is accepting public input.
Parmar says he has shared his view to SD62 to “build big”; this would have also been his view as the former SD62 Board Chair (before he was elected as MLA in June 2023).
Keeping pace:
The current BC NDP government is trying to keep pace with population growth in a number of ways including the need for schools, hospitals and other infrastructure as well as health-care.
In this provincial election season, Parmar reminded folks at today’s media event that the previous provincial government waited until growth had arrived before building more school spaces.
By comparison, since 2017 the NDP government has tried to catch up, though land and construction are costly; much coordination between school districts and both provincial and municipal governments is undertaken. For this task, about 10 years ago SD62 created its own administrative process for projecting student population and managing the development of new schools.
SD62 Superintendent Paul Block says that student population pressures are seen right now at the secondary school level (Grades 9 to 12); all the high schools will be full this fall, with portables required at all of Belmont Secondary School in Langford (enrollment approximately 1,550 this fall), Royal Bay Secondary School in Colwood (enrollment approximately 1,550 this fall), and EMCS in Sooke (enrollment around 700 this fall).
| SD62 High Schools | Belmont | Royal Bay | EMCS |
| School Capacity | 1,200 | 1,400 | 650 |
| Current Student Population | 1,550 | 1,550 | 700 |
| Portables on Site | 5 (up by 2 for this Sept) | 4 | 2 |
The new North Langford middle school for which land was announced today (construction funding yet to be approved) will help absorb the large intake of Kindergarten and elementary school students as seen in the last few years as young families continue moving to the area served by SD62. There are currently about 936 Kindergarten students enrolled for the 2024-2025 school year.
All school population numbers are dynamic and do not capture students who have moved or left the District over these last few summer months, says Kristen McGillivray, Manager, Strategic Communications, SD62.
“It has always been an issue for us around space,” said SD62 Board Chair Amanda Dowhy today at the high school construction site.
SD62 is projecting a 1,300-seat deficit at the secondary level by 2030 (currently that deficit is 550 — see table above), 700 at the middle school level, and 765 for elementary (which takes into account the new South Colwood Elementary opening in September 2025).
Creative space:
‘Creative’ ways are used to still provide classroom space, says SD62 Superintendent Paul Block. That includes getting some modular units in place on available land before schools are fully built, as well as of course using portables that can be relocated around the district. In previous years, a lot of specialized classroom spaces (like music rooms) were converted back to regular classroom space.
“There is not a lot of available space in which to house our school sites,” Dowhy said, remarking on the housing development happening throughout Langford and the west shore.
Security with more land:
“We now have the security in knowing we have another plot of land to be able to build a middle school,” said Dowhy. She notes that this will provide “all three levels of education on the north side of the highway in North Langford”.
That’s interesting wording as in “security in knowing”, as one never knows how the upcoming 2024 BC provincial election will pan out. SD62 relies heavily on their partnership with Parmar as MLA, particularly as he was school board chair for so long and really understands the needs of schools in the west shore region.
“With this new site for a future middle school, families in Langford can be confident that their children will have access to quality education closer to home,” said Parmar today.
Since 2017, the provincial government has invested over $270 million in creating 2,660 new student spaces in the Sooke School District, both by building new schools and expanding existing facilities.
Funding profile:
The newly acquired 7.2 acre site for the future SD62 middle school at 2460 Gateway Road comes at a cost of $25 million — about $21 million from province and “just under $4 million” from SD62.
Who was there:
Attending today’s school land acquisition announcement were Langford Mayor Scott Goodmanson and city councillors Kimberley Guiry, Lillian Spzak, Mary Wager and Keith Yacucha.
“The City will continue to work with SD62 and the Province to support the development of additional schools to meet the community’s ongoing needs,” says Goodmanson.
Attending from Langford senior staff were Darren Kiedyk, CAO and Donna Petrie, Senior Manager of Communications and Economic Development.
SD62 senior executive on hand today included Superintendent Paul Block, Secretary-Treasurer Harold Cull, and former Superintendent Scott Stinson. In addition to SD62 Board Chair Amanda Dowhy, SD62 trustees there today were Cendra Beaton and Christine Lervold.
Representing the West Shore Developers Association on site today were Jim Hartshorne, Ron Coutre and Rohan Rupf.
===== RELATED:
- SD62 portables on the move in Colwood & Langford with budget implications (June 5, 2024)
- Robust registration expected for Sept 2024 Kindergarten (January 4, 2024)
- NEWS SECTIONS: K-12 EDUCATION NEWS | SD62 NEWS | BC PROVINCIAL ELECTION 2024