Dear Editor
In "Major School facing closure" (Regional Optimist, April 18) reference is made to the distance between Major School and the receiving school of Luseland to be 30 kilometres. A quick Google search shows the distance is actually 39.7 kilometres. Still, the issue of closing Major School because it is .3 kilometres short of the 40 kilometre limit to designate a school of neccessity is laughable when the Living Sky School Board members have no problem disregarding their own policy of not putting students on a bus prior to 7:30 a.m.
In order for the students of the division to get to Luseland School, we are looking at practical departure times beginning at 7:15 a.m. There may be students who do get on the bus that early in other areas already. My question is, why is this acceptable? There isn't a member of that board that would take a paying job that required them to leave their homes that early and travel that distance in a bus on gravel roads unless they were getting paid a substantial amount of money. But, they are telling our students that they should.
Another point of contention I have is with Ken Arsenault's comments that there is no extra curricular activities at Major School. I hope those comments have been misrepresented, because if not, then it shows me that Mr. Arsenault has not paid attention to anything that goes on at this school. The anger felt by students and parents over this absurd comment is palpable.
The staff, students, parents and community of Major School go above and beyond to provide our students with a wide variety of sports, art, travel and educational activities. For the size of our school, we bring more participants to division activities than other schools in the division. Our school recently participated in the Canada wide science fair for our region and were one of only three Living Sky School Division schools to participate.
The sense I got from the article and the comments by board members is that this all comes down to dollars. Because it is not about the students. Major School provides a quality education to it's children and there is no lack of opportunity or success to be seen. This is due to the dedication of our staff, students and parents, who believe in the school, not as an institution, but as an extension of our homes where responsibility to ourselves and our communities is the ultimate goal.
Closing Major School will place every student it puts on a bus an hour and 35 minutes at a disadvantage, all to save money that I am sure is leaking out of every department in this division. Closing Major School will not solve Living Sky School Division's budget problem. It's a Band-aid. It will not better the lives of its students from Major nor anywhere else in the division. And once the vote is cast, I'm sure the board members will be relieved that the decision is made and they can move forward. I won't. Because I will have to get a six-year-old up in the fall at 6:45 a.m. ao she can have an opportunity to eat some breakfast before the bus comes for her.
Charlene Patton
Major
