The calendar flip makes it official: another summer has blown by. As the days shorten and start to cool down, Sea to Sky public school students are getting back into the routine and heading back to the classroom.
One week before schools officially open their doors to students on Sept. 5, Pique caught up with Sea to Sky School District 48 (SD48) superintendent Chris Nicholson to hear what’s on tap for classrooms across the corridor in 2023-24.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Pique: B.C. is experiencing its worst wildfire season on record. Have mass evacuations prompted the district to reevaluate its emergency protocols? What can Sea to Sky students expect if there was to be a natural disaster, like a wildfire, in their community during the school year?
Chris Nicholson: Obviously, our hearts go out to any families affected out there. [Most Sea to Sky locals] have been very, very, very lucky. We’re keeping a close eye, obviously—we’ve got a large school district, so whenever things pop up, we hear about them—but our firefighters are doing an incredible job of keeping everybody safe.
What I would have people reference is … policy 301, which is our emergency preparedness policy that outlines our response to things like environmental catastrophes or natural disasters, and then each school has a school emergency response plan, which outlines everybody’s rules, and we follow the same sort of command structure as the police and fire—that’s sort of a standard across school districts, to ensure that we’re speaking the same language. Of course, in all [situations] we defer to the local authorities, so they become the incident commander.
I will say—and this is probably good timing—we review our policies every five years, and emergency preparedness, that 300 series, is being reviewed this year. We will attend to any necessary changes, but our district has comprehensive policies and procedures to follow in the event of a disaster. We’d encourage folks to take a look at the current one, if they have questions or concerns, and know it’s actually being reviewed.
With September around the corner, how is enrolment looking across the school district heading into this year?
Our first board meeting of the year is coming up on Sept. 13, and that’s when we do the preliminary enrolment review. Currently, registration is still going on. There’s lots of things that may change between now and the first day of school, but we’re looking relatively stable. We’re not looking to see any big jumps in enrolment—increases or decreases—so I think it’s going to be pretty stable, but again, lots can happen between now and then.
We do our enrolment submission—the student count, it’s called … throughout September. By the end of the month of September, all final numbers are provided to the ministry, and then in the October board meeting, we do a presentation on our final enrolment. So that’s when we’ll have the actual numbers. But again, right now we’re not seeing any trends that are concerning, either increase or decrease. We look to be relatively stable across the district, but we’ll have details about specific regions later on … it’s too early to tell right now. We have folks on waitlists and requests to move to the schools right now, so it all needs to shake out over the next couple of weeks.
Speaking of enrolment trends, a few years ago, the district named opening a new middle school in Whistler as a top capital priority. Is that still the case?
We’ve seen a change in the Baragar [Systems], the demographer [behind custom planning software used by B.C. school districts].
They’re the professionals who look at in-and-out migration and housing, and all of those things, and with our local knowledge, provide that information to us. We had seen what looked like a big spike in population in Whistler, and that’s when the [idea for a new] middle school came into being, but as time has gone on, Baragar has readjusted and changed their projections. We’re actually not seeing a spike in population in Whistler, that at this time, makes a middle school the No. 1 priority. It is still on a priority list, but our No. 1 priority that we reported out on our capital plan that we submit to the ministry is the expansion of Howe Sound Secondary [in Squamish], where we are also slated for a seismic upgrade. So to save the public money, we proposed doing a seismic upgrade and an expansion at Howe Sound Secondary to become a Grade 9 to 12 school. [Currently, the school accommodates students in Grades 10 to 12.]
That would mean the reconfiguration of Don Ross [Middle School] to [accommodate Grades] 6 to 8, and our elementary schools in Squamish to all be K-to-5. In terms of projecting forward, for projected growth for Squamish over the next couple years, that would be the best way forward to support students coming in.
The middle school for Whistler is still on the docket—we don’t want it to go away in case there is that need in future years—but our No. 1 priority is the seismic upgrade and expansion of Howe Sound Secondary, because of course we’re competing for limited dollars from the ministry for all the other capital asks out there, in big districts like Surrey that are growing exponentially. We know that there’s going to be lots of focus on those sorts of districts, so we’re hopeful. We learn in the springtime each year if our major capital projects have been approved or not.
Do you have a timeframe in mind of when that expansion might be able to take place?
Following the approval from the ministry, because they control the purse strings on those sorts of developments, it can be anywhere from—just a ballpark, when it’s an expansion and upgrades … it can be as much as a three- to five-year process to get that done, because of all the requirements.
Another big topic of conversation around SD48 leading up to the pandemic was a pilot project about “communicating student learning” that started in 2017. In 2019, that appeared to be going pretty well, and more teachers and classes were jumping on board. What’s the status of those “gradeless report cards” now?
We’ll be discussing it at the board meeting, and we’ve shared out information to parents in the lead-up to [the end of the school year], the Ministry of Education has now made official the reporting order that all districts follow. We were a pilot district long before that, but [Kindergarten to Grade 9] is now on a provincial proficiency scale—so there are no letter grades for K to 9, just still in Grades 10 to 12. Because of the wonderful work of our teachers jumping on board early, being a part of the pilot project, I feel we’re in a very good position to transition into the new reporting order … Many of our parents have not had letter grades on their [children’s] report cards, K to 9, for a number of years.
That seems like it goes hand-in-hand with the shift to a more personalized learning in B.C.’s curriculum over the past few years.
One-hundred per cent … We’re really thrilled that we feel that we’re aligned with a progressive ministry who you know has a real future orientation focus for our students. Because of course we don’t know what’s going to happen in the future, right? We can’t possibly imagine what sort of jobs are going to be out there, so we know that more than content, knowledge, it’s really that ability to be flexible, to collaborate, be a critical thinker, that’s so important for students moving forward.
What are some of the biggest priorities for the district for the school year ahead?
Our continued focus on student health and well-being is absolutely a priority; our focus on equity continues, because while we’re proud of how our kids are doing, and of our grad rates, we still have that gap between students of Indigenous ancestry and resident students, so that’s obviously a concern. Truth and reconciliation is still a top priority, and obviously, student learning. Coming out of COVID, we want to ensure kids are feeling supported academically as well, so we have that continued focus on literacy and numeracy … and of course, we are still very much aware of concerns around bussing. We’re continuing to recruit bus drivers and custodians.
Nicholson invited all interested families to attend the first SD48 board meeting of the year in-person or virtually on Sept. 13. The school board’s regular public meetings usually take place on the second Wednesday each month, beginning at 6 p.m. at the School Board Office on 2nd Avenue in Squamish. More information is available at sd48seatosky.org
