A handful of stopgap measures are being deployed to ease the pressure at Duchess Park Secondary School where the number of students attending remains significantly above its capacity.
As of Sept. 30, enrollment was 1,030 and although the count is 25 fewer than at the same point last year, it's still above the capacity of 900 students as listed by the Ministry of Education, according to a staff report to school board trustees.
The report was included in the agenda package for the board's Oct. 30 meeting. The newly-elected school board will be sworn in this Tuesday.
Steps to deal with the excess have included a "creative use of space" such as establishing a mobile biology lab in the school's theatre while Biology 11 is being taught this semester.
"Movable and adjustable tables, portable microscope collections etc. are being utilized," staff says in the report. "The space has actually become popular with teachers and students."
As well, a Grade 10 Math class is being held in the school's art room, "with little or no impact on instruction," and a French Immersion Math 10 class is meeting in the conference room.
"The teacher likes the space as it aligns with the 'Thinking Classroom' approach. Students write on glass walls instead of whiteboards."
During the second semester, social studies and math classes will be meeting in the conference room as an additional classroom has been created in the space.
On top of that, several courses are being offered in so-called X and Y blocks at times outside the regular day: Band 8-12, Soccer 8-12, Work Experience 12, Personal Fitness, Leadership and Volleyball during the first semester and Band 8-12 during the second.
As for longer-term solutions, moving French Immersion to Prince George Secondary School received a hard no from parents who responded to a survey in May and June, with 60 per cent saying they would not support the move.
In an interview this week, school board chair Tim Bennett disagreed when asked if making the move would be the "quickest and easiest" way to bring enrollment at DPSS down to its capacity.
"We're soon to be facing capacity issues at a lot of our high schools," he said and noted College Heights Secondary School and a number of elementary schools are nearing or at capacity.
"Looking at Prince George as a whole, many of our schools are going to have to be part of that conversation," Bennett said.
The situation represents a remarkable turnaround from 2010 when the school district endured a round of school closures due to declining enrollment. As it now stands, the school district's total enrollment is just over 13,000 - noticeably above the 11,900 it was expected to be this year in a report presented to trustees in 2015.
Bennett called the unexpected growth a "great news story" and added it looks like the upward trend will continuing for awhile. So-called capacity issues will be top of mind for the new school board, he said.
"We heard during the election that catchment capacity was a big issue," Bennett said. "So the board is going to have to sit down and look at that very early into our mandate."
A committee established to tackle the issue will deliver a report to trustees early in the new year.
