Surrey school district's survey seeking solutions to overcrowding draws outrage from parents, teachers

Parents and teachers are calling on the B.C. government to construct more schools in Surrey after the school district sent out a survey seeking solutions to a worsening overcrowding problem.

Surrey Schools says it's seeing an average of 2,400 students join over the last two years, compared to 800 new students per year in the previous decade — a 200 per cent increase in school enrolment.

On Nov. 20, the school district sent parents a survey, asking for their input on long-term educational strategies to manage the ballooning enrolment numbers — with some proposed solutions including hybrid learning, tri-semester schooling, evening classes and bussing students to other schools.

Teachers say the district's proposed solutions will likely lead to more stress on a stretched workforce, while parents highlighted their potential negative impacts on working parents and the broader school community.

Cindy Dalglish, whose daughter attends École Salish Secondary, said the survey showed the school district was pitting priorities against each other and taking away children's rights.

"You've got one student who's in the morning, one student who's in the afternoon or in a different semester," she said of the proposed solutions. "Where's the family time in that? How are they getting to school? … What about child care?

"All those community support pieces are missing in these equations when they're … asking about shifts and additional semesters."

Dalglish also questioned whether the school district has the staffing necessary to execute any proposed changes.

Another parent said some of the proposed solutions — including using office buildings for schools — seemed a reasonable way to solve overcrowding.

However, she also said some of the solutions felt top-down and corporate.

"Are they suggesting that schools should use corporate solutions like shifts and remote work?" Rebecca Yoshizawa, chair of Kwantlen Polytechnic University's sociology department whose two children attend school in Surrey, told Amy Bell on On The Coast.

"School is not a factory. It's not Airbnb," she said.

"Schools are about community and communities are about offering people resilience to their challenges. When you think about moving kids around, bussing them, different shifts, I can really see how this would diminish the resiliency of communities."

District says it needs to prepare for growing population

Ritinder Matthew, a spokesperson for Surrey Schools, said the proposed solutions were still in the consideration stage, but the overcrowding in Surrey schools is dire.

"Looking out 10 years from now we have the SkyTrain coming through Surrey as well," she said. "The entire Fleetwood corridor, our enrolment is going to increase even more. And so we need to start preparing for that."

Jatinder Bir, president of the Surrey Teachers' Association, said teachers have been sounding the alarm on poor conditions and an overreliance on portables due to the lack of permanent school spaces.

"If you're asking about putting 50 per cent of the courses online, well, that changes how we teach," she said. "There's also equity issues to that. So how do you get students to have access to technology, Wi-Fi, bandwidth?"

Bir said the provincial government has a responsibility to "step up and do the right thing" by funding more permanent school spaces in B.C.'s second-largest city.

"We're going to create the next generation of global citizens, and we need to make sure that our education system doesn't suffer because of lack of space."

In an emailed statement to CBC News, Rachna Singh, B.C.'s minister of education and child care, said she was concerned about some of the options outlined in the survey, but trusts that the district would discuss these options with the ministry before making any decisions.

Singh added that the ministry and district are working together on "innovative" solutions to expand school capacity, including three new prefabricated additions that will add 875 new student seats in Surrey starting next school year.

The province has spent approximately $700 million to create more than 12,000 new student seats in Surrey, including building six new schools and 11 expansions since 2017, according to the ministry.

Construction is underway on two new elementary schools and two more are being expanded, Singh said.

"I will continue to work with the Surrey School District trustees to ensure that students are supported and thriving in Surrey schools," she said.