SD23 opts for dual track French Immersion as Bellevue Creek reopens

• Board voted for Dual Track F.I.
• Rejects the single track option
• Bellevue Creek Elementary will reopen

Trustees for the Central Okanagan Public Schools (SD23) have unanimously voted to re-open Bellevue Creek Elementary in 2022-2023 to help address crowded schools.

The vote came during Wednesday’s public board meeting.

All Kindergarten and Grade 1 English and French Immersion programs at École Dorothea Walker Elementary will be moved to Bellevue Creek starting in the fall.

The two schools are 1.4 km apart.

In 2023-2024, the Grade 2 English and French Immersion programs at École Dorothea Walker will be discontinued and will be established at Bellevue Creek.

École Dorothea Walker Elementary will be a grades 2-5 English program and grades 2-6 French Immersion program in 2022/23 and a grades 3-6 program in the next year and beyond.

The board also signed off on renaming the school to École Bellevue Creek Elementary School.

The decision to reopen the school will help ease the current 129 per cent utilization at École Dorothea Walker, Anne McClymont, and Chute Elementary Schools.

The decision also rejected an option to have single track French Immersion at Dorothea Walker.

Re-opening Bellevue Creek has been strongly considered for the last couple of months to help accommodate over 270 students across 12 classrooms.

The childcare services currently leased at Bellevue are allowed to stay in their current location for one more year.

Along with the program re-alignment, students enrolled at École Dorothea Walker, Anne McClymont and Chute will retain their enrollment priority as “catchment or French Immersion catchment area students” and will retain their current transportation eligibility if they stay at their current school and live at the same address.

Siblings of the students with catchment status will fall under the same umbrella.

In a meeting earlier this month, SD23 Board Chair Moyra Baxter had concerns about a single-track school saying it may create perceptions of elitism.

“Our experience has been that it [dual track] can work very well and can be wonderful opportunity to promote a community of the small people at our schools. And I support this motion,” she said.

In a previous survey, only 17 per cent of people preferred the primary dual track option.