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Report to the Minister on Kawartha Pine Ridge District School Board Peterborough Secondary School Accommodation Review
February 17, 2012
The Honourable Laurel Broten Minister of Education 900 Bay Street 22
nd
 Floor Toronto, M7A 1L2
Re: Independent Facilitator’s Report on the Peterborough Secondary School  Accommodation Review, KPRDSB
Dear Minister, The purpose of this letter is to provide you with my findings as the Independent Facilitator of the administrative review of the accommodation review process undertaken by the Kawartha Pine Ridge District School Board (KPRDSB) regarding the secondary schools of the City of Peterborough. The schools included in the accommodation review were the following Peterborough secondary schools:
 
Thomas A. Stewart Secondary School
 
 Adam Scott Collegiate Vocational Institute and Intermediate School
 
Kenner Collegiate Vocational Institute and Intermediate School
 
Peterborough Collegiate and Vocational School The request for an administrative review was filed by Shirl Delarue, Jay Amer, Margaret Marchen, Eileen Madder, Andrew Pyle and Michael Saunders. The request was accompanied by signatures representing 33% of eligible families. Board staff has also validated the list of petitioners regarding their eligibility in terms of each person's school affiliation, parent or student status, and record of participation in the accommodation review process.I was appointed by your Ministry on January 3, 2012 to conduct this administrative review. I was present in Peterborough from January 16
th
to January 20, 2012. During that time, I spoke with the Board of Trustees, the Director of Education, senior school board officials, the members of the Accommodation Review Committee (ARC), the petitioners, the principals of the four schools involved, some staff members and students of the affected schools, representatives of teacher federations and support staff unions and officials of the City of Peterborough including the Mayor and the Chief of Police. A public meeting was held on Wednesday January18, 2012. It was attended by approximately 350 members of the public. At this meeting, I heard presentations from 47 individuals. During the course of my review, I also received and reviewed written submissions from many members of the four school communities affected by the Peterborough Secondary School Accommodation Review. In addition to the written submissions that I received during my week in the KPRDSB, I invited interested parties to forward further commentary via email for a two week period following my time in Peterborough. I received many submissions during this time which largely reflected and amplified the polarized views I heard during my meetings with the various stakeholders in the community.
 
 2 I was privileged to visit each of the schools under review. The issues of this review notwithstanding, I want to comment on the very positive learning and teaching environments I found in each of the four secondary schools under review. High levels of student engagement, dynamic and innovative instructional approaches and multifaceted partnerships with the community to meet the needs of vulnerable students were evident in each school. In particular, I want to comment on the vibrant and enthusiastic leadership of each of the principals with whom I met. I can honestly say as a parent of four myself that I would have been delighted to interact with any one of these school leaders when my children were in secondary school. My meetings with the community and stakeholders were ably facilitated by Norm Stormes and Mary Fairhead of the Barrie Regional Office of the Ministry of Education. The parents, trustees, board officials, board staff, students and community members with whom I met were all very generous with their time and their perspectives and our conversations were frank and productive. I appreciate their assistance particularly given the discussions were often charged with passionate opinions.
TERMS OF REFERENCE
The following terms of reference were established by your Ministry for my work as the Independent Facilitator conducting this administrative review. PRINCIPLES School boards, parents, communities and the government recognize that school boards have the legal right to close schools after following a board-approved pupil accommodation review process. The Ministry of Education released the revised Pupil Accommodation Review Guideline (2009:B7) on June 26, 2009. The Guideline provides direction to school boards regarding pupil accommodation reviews undertaken to determine the future of a school or a group of schools. School boards are responsible for establishing and following their own accommodation review policies. School boards’ accommodation review policies are to reflect the requirements of the Ministry’s Pupil Accommodation Review Guideline. Under the Pupil Accommodation Review Guideline, schools are required to make school valuation the centre of board and community decision-making. School valuation requires school boards to consider the value of a school or schools, based on community consultation. SCOPE OF THE REVIEW The independent facilitator shall be responsible for: Determining whether the KPRDSB followed its board-approved pupil accommodation review process in conducting the accommodation review; Reviewing formal documentation, interviewing relevant participants including  Accommodation Review Committee (ARC) members, petitioners and board staff; Submitting a written report to the Minister of Education upon completion of the review.
 
 3 REPORTING TO THE MINISTER The report should be in the form of a letter to the Minister, indicating whether the accommodation review process followed the board’s pupil accommodation review policy. The Minister is responsible and will make the facilitator’s findings available to the board and the public in a timely fashion.
PROFILE OF THE BOARD
The Kawartha Pine Ridge District School Board encompasses almost 7,000 square kilometers, including Clarington, Northumberland and Peterborough Counties. It serves the communities located in the Kawarthas to the north, and south to Lake Ontario. Hastings County is the eastern border and the western border extends to the City of Kawartha Lakes and to the edge of the City of Oshawa. The Board has 76 elementary schools and 17 secondary schools, including three adult and alternative learning centres to serve urban and rural communities.  As of October 31, 2011, the KPRDSB has approximately 34,515 students (32,361 full-time equivalent): 21,995 elementary students (19,975 full-time equivalent) and 12,520 secondary students (12,386 full-time equivalent). 23,000 students are bused to school every day on 500 different bus routes. The KPRDSB student population has the following characteristics:
 Percentage of students for whom language of instruction is not their first language: 1.6%
 Percentage of students with First Nation, Métis and Inuit ancestry: 1.6%
 Percentage of students who have completed 16 credits as of June 30 of their second year of high school: 74%
 Percentage of students (Grade 1 to Grade 12) with Individual Education Plans (IEPs): 21% The Board has approximately 3,500 employees, including 1,228 elementary teachers, 892 secondary teachers and close to 1,400 union and non-union support and administrative staff, including secretaries, custodial and maintenance staff, education assistants, professional and paraprofessional staff, technicians, principals, vice-principals, supervisors and senior staff. KPRDSB receives the assistance of over 8,000 volunteers in their schools. The Board is governed by 11 Trustees, including a First Nations Trustee. The Board also has a Student Trustee. It is interesting to note that the 2011 Statistics Canada census results indicate that Peterborough is the municipality with the highest proportion of the population 65 or older in Canada. Like many school districts in Ontario, the KPRDSB is facing serious declining enrolment – with 18 percent or 7,000 fewer students than in 2002-03. In the last decade, there has been a decline of over 900 students in the four secondary schools under review and the schools are more than 1,000 students below the capacity of their buildings. Board projections indicate that this pattern will continue and over the next four years, that number will rise to approximately 1,767 students below the capacity of the four schools collectively. Program viability and breadth of options have been severely challenged by this enrolment decline.

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