Overview: This is the first of the archival content pieces. It looks at the declining French Immersion enrolment at the secondary level, and the future of the program at Mission Secondary School.
In 1998, French Immersion enrolment at the high school level had begun to see a significant decline in School District 75. This decline led the Mission school board to call a meeting to discuss and review the future of the secondary school track of the French Immersion program in Mission, British Columbia which would take place on February 3, at Mission Secondary. To address the declining enrolment, the School Board’s proposed solution was to move the program from Mission Secondary school to the district’s newest high school, Heritage Park, which had just recently opened its doors 3 years prior in 1995. When Heritage Park Secondary opened its doors, SD75 promoted the idea that each of Mission’s three secondary schools should have a different focus. For the last 10 years, the French Immersion program at the high school level had been operating out of Mission Secondary, which had been identified as the school for multicultural support, seeing how it housed not only the French Immersion program, but also English as a Second Language and other language programs such as Mandarin, Punjabi, and Spanish. This led to many concerns over the potential relocation of the program as it would drastically change the identity Mission Secondary had adopted as the multicultural school.
The Mission School Board sent out a survey to the parents who had children enrolled in the French Immersion program to gather information regarding which school they wanted their children to attend and if they would keep their children in the French Immersion program if it were to be relocated. This survey, however, led to many parents voicing that they felt left out of the decision-making process, particularly the parents who did not have children enrolled in the program. These parents felt that they should have a say in the program’s location, as such a big decision would surely impact the broader school community as well. Many questions were raised by these parents, which they asked the School Board to consider before making their final decision: would the focus of the three high schools change? What would Mission Secondary’s new focus be if it were no longer language? Would there still be room for Heritage Park’s catchment students if the French Immersion program were to move there? Would the catchment boundaries change? Would there be bussing to support the students’ move to the new school and what would the cost be? And how much is the program review and relocation going to cost?
After a week of uncertainty about the location of the secondary track of the French Immersion program in Mission, it was announced that the board had unanimously voted to keep the program at Mission Secondary, as the sole provider of the program at the secondary level. The meeting saw more than 300 people who came in to express their thoughts and concerns regarding the relocation, as well as several written submissions that voiced the communities opinions. The City of Mission was praised by the Canadian Parents for French (CPF), which is the nationwide volunteer organization that promotes the learning of French, for demonstrating support and passion for French language learning in their community.
References:
“French immersion could move.” Mission City Record (Mission, BC), Jan. 29, 1998.
“Parents fear school board review.” Mission City Record (Mission, BC), Jan. 29, 1998.
“Program to stay at MSS.” Mission City Record (Mission, BC), Feb., 1998.
“Vive French Immersion.” Mission City Record (Mission, BC), Mar. 5, 1998.
“Mission and vision.” Canadian Parents for French, British Columbia and Yukon. Accessed March 20, 2021. https://bc-yk.cpf.ca/en/mission-and-vision/