Shifting about 1,000 students to new schools was a smooth process for the Red Deer Public School District.
With the opening of the Don Campbell Elementary School in Inglewood, the district changed school boundaries, which put a number of students in different schools this year.
Red Deer Public Schools superintendent Stu Henry said students are getting settled into their new schools. He said the boundary review right-sized all of the schools at the elementary level.
Henry added he hasn’t heard any complaints from parents about the boundary changes.
“We got a brand new school out of it,” said Henry, at the district’s board of trustees first meeting of the 2017-18 school year on Wednesday. “Three hundred and fifty kids started school there last week and we’re rolling now.”
Another big change for the district was moving the Spanish bilingual program from Pines School to Grandview Elementary. Last year, the program had about 120 students.
By moving the bilingual program to Grandview, most English students at Grandview were amalgamated at Mountview School.
Henry said the district’s middle schools are “bursting at the seems,” and he hopes the government will grant the board a new middle school in the near future.
“That would necessitate us doing another boundary review, but it would be worth it just to get a little breathing room in the schools,” he said.
The district’s high schools “are getting very tight too,” Henry added.