At the end of September, Fransaskois parents had the unpleasant surprise of learning that the Parc school, a temporary solution while waiting for a new establishment to open for their children, would ultimately be sold rather than kept. A disappointment for many of them.
The confirmation of the sale of the Parc school by the provincial Ministry of Education disappoints more than one within the Fransaskois community.
“We were shocked to learn of the confirmation of the sale to the Regina Christian Schools Association,” laments the Collective of Worried and Concerned Parents (CPIP) in a press release.
A new school that will not be enough
At the start of the school year in September, the Parc school already had 217 registrations, with the possibility of increasing the number of students until September 30.
For the next school year of 2024-2025, the number of registered students should quickly reach 250 students.
Certainly, a new school is under construction in the northwest of the city of Regina, but it will have a capacity of only 325 students, which will quickly become insufficient given the growing demand.
Furthermore, parents cannot count on the Monseigneur de Laval school to take over, as the latter is already operating at full capacity. and lacking resources to meet demand.
According to the CPIC representative, Jean de Dieu Ndayahundwa, parents are very worried about this situation.
“Obviously, this is a very serious error on the part of the Saskatchewan government which will unfortunately have harmful consequences for French-language education in Regina,” he asserts.
What solution for children?
For the stakeholders of the Fransaskois community, the solution was clear: the Parc school would have had to be kept and made into a new school within the Conseil des écoles fransaskoises (CÉF).
Since the government has decided otherwise, the CPIC wants to push the provincial authorities to propose other spaces while waiting for the construction of new French-language schools in the long term.
For now, the community remains confident: “We are worried, but we are still working very hard to try to put in place a new strategy to convince the government that it must offer us another interim solution to replace the “Parc school which was also an interim solution”, expresses Jean de Dieu Ndayahundwa.
A long-term fight
If, in the history of French-language education in Saskatchewan, parents and community members have always had to fight for resources, the growing demand for French-language offerings could well help them.
“There are more and more of us,” rejoices a parent of a student who wishes to remain anonymous, “it’s already a good sign. We will be able to put pressure on the government and make our voices heard. »
And he added: “We will of course have to continue on this path and, above all, remain united. Otherwise, over time, we will become a completely invisible minority,” he fears.
For Jean de Dieu Ndayahundwa, the needs in terms of infrastructure and financing are not about to be met.
“We are realistic: we know that the problem will probably persist in the long term,” concedes the CPIP spokesperson.
The latter nevertheless remains optimistic, as long as “parents and members of the community continue to make their voices heard before the government, and why not at the court level”.
The parents’ collective also wanted to send a message to the Minister of Education: “We are not going to give up, it will be better to listen to us than to turn a deaf ear”, firmly says Jean de Dieu Ndayahundwa.
Regina’s new French-language elementary school will be located on the site of the former Ken-Jenkins school, in the northwest of the city. Its inauguration is planned for 2025.
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