CBC Winnipeg
New school for East Selkirk
WINNIPEG - The province has decided to move ahead with plans to build a new middle school in the community of East Selkirk.
The project to help alleviate overcrowding at Happy Thought School had been put on hold earlier this fall. Gail Bagnall, superintendant of the Lord Selkirk School Division, says the Public Schools Finance Board was concerned about construction costs for the new school.
Bagnall thinks recent media attention convinced the board to change its mind about the delay.
"Apparently they are now satisfied that this increase and the overrun is going to be tolerable to the Public Schools Finance Board," she says.
About 700 students between kindergarten and Grade 9 attend Happy Thought, which has a capacity of 600. The situation is considered one of the worst cases of student overcrowding in Manitoba. The students are housed in a hodge-podge of additions and portable classrooms; they study in hallways and wait in lines to use the restrooms.
Bagnall hopes the new school will be open in time for the start of the 2005/06 school year.