Good news and perhaps bad news

[leeanne]

The good news is that kindergarten will be back to full time days starting in the year 2011! Yay! Means Chase will be going two years later and will be there full time days.

Bad news is, there is a rumour that my kids' school may be closing down. We live in a rural area and the school is a small school but a great school, of 145 kids.

They keep closing down these small schools. It's stinking ridiculous. Here we don't have to worry about the elementary kids trying to sell drugs to other kids, we don't have to worry about needles in the playground (trust me, it's bad when a school is teaching the kids to go tell a teacher if they find a needle.), and my kids have had awesome help with some reading/learning assistance.

 

[morri]

I guess they are doing it anywhere the clsoing down / Hope the public has a say and they don't

 

[CeliaM]

Sorry to hear a good little school might be shutting down. That really stinks.

I'm personally of a split mind on full-day K. Some kids might thrive, and it certainly is a good thing for high-risk kids, but I think most kids would do better at home with their families.

 

[leeanne]

The school board is having a meeting on Tuesday and I have my hands on the agenda for that meeting. They are in fact reviewing closing down the school. So it's no rumor.

Signs are very much pointing that it will close. One teacher was going to retire last year but stayed on more year. I've heard the principal might retire this year. And another teacher left at the beginning of this school year and secured himself a job elsewhere.

So sad! It's the small schools that have more one on one and give kids the help that they need. Whereas bigger schools tend to ignore kids' problems.

EDIT: It's the last small school in our city, so it is on the chopping block. I will be making a big effort to attend that meeting on Tuesday.

 

[morri]

I hope you and others can change it .

 

[Vickie]

that is sad, hope the meeting tomorrow goes well

 

[leeanne]

In the meantime, there is a Fine Arts school of which has a waiting list. So even if their school closed and they went to another until they were accepted at the Fine Arts school, I guess so be it. I'll be putting Amanda, Jayden and even Chase's application in this week.

This Fine Arts school is awesome and not only do they teach the normal curriculum, they teach the fine Arts like Dance, drama, music, and visual arts according to what best fits the child.

Jayden has always loved to draw and has drawn well since he was 3 so visual arts for him. And Amanda, I'd love for her to be in dance.

Was talking to another parent and this is what we are going to do.

 

[tasha41]

The fine arts school sounds awesome!

But it's sad they are going to look at closing down the small schools. The school across the street where I went JK-8 was a school of 420, and it just absorbed a smaller school of about 98 kids this past school year as the smaller one was shut down. I can understand why with the funding cuts that have been taking place and operating costs going up (or so it is for Ont.. sure it's similar there) but it still stinks!

Do you know if JK is lost when they add full day kindergarten or is JK still there and still half day?

 

[morri]

Is the fine arts school any like Waldorf school , or is it just a school that has the fine arts in the curriculum too?

 

[leeanne]

Is the fine arts school any like Waldorf school , or is it just a school that has the fine arts in the curriculum too?

Fine arts is in the curriculum.

But not sure what Waldorf school is hon?

 

[leeanne]

The fine arts school sounds awesome!

But it's sad they are going to look at closing down the small schools. The school across the street where I went JK-8 was a school of 420, and it just absorbed a smaller school of about 98 kids this past school year as the smaller one was shut down. I can understand why with the funding cuts that have been taking place and operating costs going up (or so it is for Ont.. sure it's similar there) but it still stinks!

Do you know if JK is lost when they add full day kindergarten or is JK still there and still half day?

Do you mean Preschool when you say JK?

If so, preschools here are a separate school for kids and it is usually 2 1/2 hours.

Sorry if I am being daft. LOL Never heard the term JK.

 

[tasha41]

Lol, well here we have JK and SK, JK being the one you start the year you turn 4, kindergarten the year you turn 5.. preschool is purely optional but the year you turn 3 and not publicly funded, JK & SK aren't mandatory, but are available

 

[leeanne]

Ah, ok. I understand. Here we don't have JK or SK. It's just kindergarten and they start kindergarten the year they turn 5, even if they turn 5 after September. As long as the child is 5 before December of that year they start. Amanda was 2 months away from being 5 when she started.

 

[morri]

Is the fine arts school any like Waldorf school , or is it just a school that has the fine arts in the curriculum too?

Fine arts is in the curriculum.

But not sure what Waldorf school is hon?

Waldorf schools are usually private school that have a 'policy' set on learning together and especially the fine arts(art classes, music classes etc,) and they don't give grades either.

heres and article on Wikipedia about it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waldorf_education

I guess though that they are more common in Europe than in the US.