Shuswap Your Classified Connection / Vol. 27 No. 11 March 11, 2016
Market News
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Inside Shuswap
Illuminated performance
n Sydnee Thomson, along with other Just for Kicks dancers, portrays a hyena in the dance studio’s production of The Lion King on Friday, March 4.
Spring forward
Turn your clocks ahead one hour Saturday night. Plus South Shuswap A8,9 Sports A19
Chase
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Heat tested
Tight contest in KIJHL playoffs. Plus Chase Excellence A24 Curler recognized A24
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EVAN BUHLER/MARKET NEWS
Board postpones school closures
Education: Trustees must now decide which programs to cut to balance budget. By Tracy Hughes
MARKET NEWS STAFF
There won’t be any school closures in the North Okanagan-Shuswap School District for 2016. At Tuesday night’s school board meeting, trustees took the unexpected step of voting to extend the consultation period for the proposed closure of Silver Creek Elementary and Armstrong Elementary by one year until April 2017. A majority of trustees said they did not feel they had adequate infor-
mation to make the decision on closing the elementary schools by April 26, which was the target date if the schools were going to be closed by September 2016. There was particular concern about the demographic and enrolment projections for both the Armstrong and Silver Creek areas, as well as the elimination of the middle school model currently operating at Len Wood in Armstrong. This does nothing to alleviate the school district’s budget pressures, which will require a cut of approxi-
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mately $1.3 million for the upcoming school year. Without any savings from closing and consolidating schools, trustees are now going to have to make cuts in other areas – including reducing services to students. Possibilities include cuts to libraries, music, gifted education, career programs, literacy interventions, alternate education programs, counselling services and speech therapy. “Cuts are unavoidable, we can not balance the budget otherwise. By making the choice not to close
schools, we are going to have to choose to cut programs,” said school board chair Bobbi Johnson after the meeting. “What’s going to be cut? I don’t know right now, that will become part of our budget discussions.” The school board also moved to begin a 60-day consultation period on converting Silver Creek Elementary and Ranchero Elementary to K-8 schools. Currently, SilSee Silver Creek on page 3
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