Transition École LaVérendrye students to Earl Grey over two years. Details include the following:
- In 2015/16 relocate grade 4 to 6 École LaVérendrye students to Earl Grey.
- In 2016/17 relocate all Nursery to grade 3 École LaVérendrye students to Earl Grey and relocate all Nursery to grade 6 Earl Grey students to École LaVérendrye.
- In 2016/17 relocate grades 7 and 8 students from Earl Grey to other schools (e.g., Grant Park, River Heights, or Churchill).
- Other schools in the Division not affected.
This shares most of the benefits and drawbacks of the single-year switch. It does raise some serious additional concerns, though.
- Younger LaVérendrye students would lose the opportunity to be mentored and coached by older students in programs such as Reading Buddies (and older students would lose the valuable experience of being mentors) for a very critical year in their academic lives.
- Families with siblings straddling the two schools will need to adjust to separate drop-off times, child care, and related issues.
- Establishing a milieu setting within the English Earl Grey school would require outfitting Earl Grey with several French amenities, including library, administrative staff, washrooms, and PA system, which would have limited to no use after the transition year.
- Segregating students from each other in the same school runs the risk of making one or both student groups feel ostracized and, in the worst case, breed conflict between the groups.
- Winnipeg School Division has indicated they did not want to complete the swap until LaVérendrye's new gymnasium is complete. Given the delays so far in that project, there is no guarantee that the gym will be complete as planned in 2016, stretching the transitional period over multiple years, further amplifying the impacts noted above.
While switching schools is the best option to address both LaVérendrye's immediate concerns and long-term demographic trends in Winnipeg School Division, trying to "smooth" the process by stretching it over two years will be counter-productive and involve more disruption and cost than necessary.
