Mayor Sue McKortoff says it took more than a village — it took a town to save Osoyoos Secondary School. (Richard McGuire photo)
It took more than a village to overturn the decision to close Osoyoos Secondary School (OSS), Mayor Sue McKortoff suggests. It took a town.
And when the cheering dies down from last week’s reluctant decision by School District 53 to keep the school open, we can all pat ourselves on our backs for what we did as a community in the past six months to fight for our school.
Some deserve special kudos for going above and beyond – we’re thinking of parent Brenda Dorosz, her committees, and members of Osoyoos Town Council, Mayor McKortoff especially – but so many others in Osoyoos also did so much to keep education in our town.
Thanks to the close to 1,000 people who turned out at the first “public consultation” meeting in February at OSS. Thanks to the thousands who put their names on petitions or wrote letters. Thanks to those who donated money, goods and time. So many in Osoyoos deserve credit for this wonderful outcome.
Dorosz says that now everybody must come together as a community, as parents, with the school board and with government to work for education and the future of our children.
That’s a noble sentiment, and it certainly must happen.
But we must avoid sitting back on our laurels. Nor can we be politically naïve. The battle to keep education in Osoyoos will be ongoing.
Dorosz would like people to get on with the job ahead rather than go through the divisive process of finding fault.
But only by examining how we got into the horrendous situation that began last January when the school district suddenly announced “consultations” on school closures can we ensure it doesn’t happen again.
Enrolment at OSS has been declining over the past decade, just as it has been at other schools in the district. Local high school enrolment has fallen by 28 per cent over that time, even though enrolment at Osoyoos Elementary School has stayed more steady.
The provincial government funds students based on enrolment, and the per-student funding in B.C. is the second lowest in Canada, so a loss of students means a loss of funds.
With the recently announced Rural Education Enhancement Fund, the government is finally acknowledging that rural schools face additional challenges and that the loss of a community’s only high school is financially and socially devastating to a town.
We as a community – and especially our town council – must do our part to ensure that we can attract young families to live here, to reverse enrolment decline. This means providing good jobs and affordable housing.
We’ve been given the reprieve we wanted, but we can’t assume this issue won’t be back to bite us again.
We must now give serious thought to the question of whether it’s in Osoyoos’ best interest to remain in School District 53, and if not, what we need to do to change it.
Some have suggested Osoyoos should go it alone as its own school district. Others have suggested we should seek to join with School District 51, Boundary.
There are major advantages and disadvantages to both of these options as well as to the status quo. What is clear though is that the present system, which allows out-of-town trustees, who we don’t elect, to close our schools is dysfunctional and undemocratic.
The Cawston-Keremeos and Okanagan Falls trustees may not understand our community, but at least in the end they voted to keep our school open. We can’t necessarily count on their support next time.
The Oliver trustees were antagonistic throughout and seem to view education as a zero-sum game in which Oliver only wins when Osoyoos loses. And this attitude goes back to the 1970s when OSS was first planned, as the history shows.
The province delivered in the end, but were it not for 2017 being an election year, we might not have been so lucky. Two years from now, a new party may be in power, or this government may no longer feel the need to keep funding OSS.
Only by remaining vigilant can we ensure that Osoyoos never again faces the nightmare it’s been through these past six months.
