Melfort schools will be seeing some improvements.
The Melfort and Unit Comprehensive Collegiate will receive a $1.68 million plus tax upgrade to its ventilation, heating and air conditioning systems, while Reynolds Central will receive a $27,000 loan plus an $11,000 grant from the North East School Division for a new playground.
“MUCC, the building’s over 50 years old so it’s the end of life for lots of its systems,” said Don Rempel, the division’s director of education, after the April 11 board meeting. “We’re trying to move through the plumbing, the heating, the air exchange, the roof and the boilers over time.”
The work will be completed over the 2016-17 and 2017-18 school years by Black and McDonald. Expenditures for the project are not to exceed $2.04 million.
As for Reynolds, the school is at a point where they want to begin the playground project.
“They’ve done a lot of work on the playground and they want to see a structure up quickly, so they’ve approached the board to help them do that,” he said.
They will be expected to pay the loan over five years.
Luke Perkins, the division’s chair, noted the situation was unique within the NESD.
“I think this is a good example of where we don’t look at things with a cookie cutter approach.”
Online consultations to begin
The division is looking to consult with students, parents and the community using an online tool.
“We have a new board with a four-year mandate, so we want to ask the public what they should be focusing on over and above what the requirements of the education sector strategic plan are,” Rempel said.
The goal is to begin after Easter. With the online tool, ThoughtExchange, participants will be able to submit their thoughts about the direction of the school division. From that, broad themes will be picked out. Participants will then be able to choose which of the themes are most important to them.
Due to the status of the school division being up in the air, the consultation has just begun. Usually, it would have begun in January.
