COTE ST-LUC - The English Montreal School Board has scrapped plans to open a new high school in Cote Saint-Luc after receiving a timid response to the proposal.
The EMSB held a two-week application period that ended Feb. 18, and the response showed the demand is simply not high enough to warrant the opening of a high school at the Parkhaven Ave. building that housed the former Wagar High School.
However, EMSB chair Angela Mancini said the proposal is not totally dead and will be revisited for the 2012-13 academic year.
"This application procedure was held outside of our traditional registration period," Mancini said in a statement. "As a result, many of the parents we spoke to had already made their choices for next year. We set a target of a certain number of students and I will say that the response was pretty good. But in the final analysis we did not feel it was enough to recommend the launch of a new school."
The EMSB was looking for 60 applicants for a Grade 7-only school that would have opened in time for the 2011-12 school year, and the final number fell just short of that number. This differs from a formal registration process in that the applicants were not screened to ensure they met all the eligibility requirements to attend the new school, so it's possible some of the applicants may have been dropped on those grounds.
The EMSB did not want to reveal how many applicants there were, with spokesman Michael Cohen saying it was a strong number that fell just short of the minimum threshold.
The EMSB held a public meeting in October that drew a big crowd of interested parents, but not enough of them followed through on the application process for the new school to be opened in the fall.
Still, the information the school board collected from those parents through questionnaires and an online survey will be valuable as the project moves forward.
"There have been many phone calls and emails from parents whose children are a few years away from high school," said Dr. Syd Wise, the EMSB commissioner for Cote Saint-Luc and the chair of a special focus committee on the project. "We will now go back to the table and see what options can be explored for 2012-2013."
