Thousands of high school students in Surrey will either have to wake up earlier or stay at school later come September.
The Surrey Board of Education says it plans to extend school hours at several secondary schools next year to combat overcrowding in the fast-growing district’s classrooms.
the plan, passed by the school board on Wednesday nightwill create five instruction blocks during the school day with students either attending periods one through four or coming later for blocks two through five.
Board vice-chair Gary Tymoschuk says the district hasn’t decided which schools are affected or exact class times, but it looks as though at least five of Surrey’s 21 public high schools will see their hours adjusted to free up about 10 to 15 per cent more student capacity.
“It’s a little bit of a first step [to] give us a little bit of breathing room to see what’s going to happen in the coming years,” said Tymoshuk in a Thursday interview with CBC News.
The Surrey school district says it saw an average of 2,400 new students joining annually over the last two years, which is triple the 800 new students per year it says it counted in the previous decade.
All but two of the district’s high schools are operating above capacity, many of them using portable classrooms Tymoschuk called “Band-Aid solutions.”
The board estimates the plan will cost an additional $65,000 to staff services like libraries for longer hours and about $280,000 in additional bussing services.
The school district and board of education, Surrey Teachers’ Association and parents have called for the government to build more schools and hire more staff to address rising enrollment they say is only expected to grow when the Surrey SkyTrain expansion is complete.
“The provincial government just isn’t providing new schools for our districts. We’re running out of space and the portables are not the answer,” said Tymoschuk.
Education and Child Care Minister Rachna Singh was not available for an interview before publication.
In a statement Thursday, Singh’s ministry said the province has approved approximately $750 million to create more than 12,400 new student seats in Surrey since 2017.
Two new secondary schools — Grandview Heights and Salish Secondary — and an addition at Sullivan Heights have opened, and there are more additions on the way at three other secondary schools, the province said.
Construction is also underway on two new elementary schools and two more are being expanded, according to the statement.
“The ministry remains determined to work with partners at the school district, local government and provincial levels to deliver the schools of Surrey students and their families need.”
‘Lots of challenges’
Extended hours was one of several options floated in a November survey that raised concerns among parents, including moving some classes online, tri-semester schedules, evening classes and bussing students to other schools.
Tymoschuk says extending hours will bring “lots of challenges” the school district is working to minimize.
He noted that two Surrey schools tried extended schedules starting in 2011, but those strategies ended in 2017.
“There’s going to be disruption to families, things like maybe two students in the same school, maybe on two different shifts,” he said. “Or perhaps you’ve got one student in an extended day school and they’ve got a sibling who goes to a nearby elementary school that again is on a different schedule.”
The Surrey school district claims city council is holding up its request for funding from the provincial government. For the first time ever, council rejected the district’s eligible school sites proposal. The school board says that leaves it in limbo at a time when Surrey schools are bursting at the seams.
Jaswinder Dilawari, whose daughter is in Grade 10 at Sullivan Heights Secondary, says he’s disappointed by the move and says it will cause problems for parents’ child-care needs and work schedules in the “mostly working class” area.
Dilawari’s wife is a teacher at Princess Margaret Secondary School and she worries the changes could make it harder to coordinate their commutes and might reduce their time together as a family.
“This will disturb the family life for all the parents, for all the children,” he said. “And instead of, having different timings for the children … the provincial government and the local municipal government should give [the school board] the funds [for] more facilities and resources to accommodate the number of students coming to study.”