Parents say ‘no’ to moving kids

[attach]1329[/attach]The message was loud and clear.

Maurice Cody parents don’t want their kids to move to Davisville.

But as it stands, three of the 11 options being tabled by the area’s Accommodation Review Committee would require just that.

Trustee Josh Matlow and superintendent Michael Smith called a meeting at North Toronto Collegiate on Feb. 18 to parents and community members from the schools affected give the committee their input.

The committee was formed, along with similar groups across the city, to deal with the problem of inefficient use of school board resources; the biggest problem being that some schools are under-populated while others are overcrowded.

Maurice Cody is overcrowded while Davisville recently added a French immersion program to boost its thin enrolment.

The committee itself has a balance of voting power and includes equal membership representing the five schools affected — Maurice Cody, Davisville, Eglinton, Spectrum and Hodgson.

But 125 of the approximately 145 attendees at the meeting, as well as 27 of the 30 speakers, were representing Maurice Cody and an opposition to any proposed boundary change.

They were easy to spot, according to Maurice Cody Family and School Association co-vice-chair Robert Beaudin, because each parent wore a paper badge as a display of solidarity. Beaudin along with fellow parents Sandra Aversa and Fiona Mitra are spearheading an
organized resistance.

“By the end of the night I think the committee had had enough,” said Beaudin, a bookseller and the father of a young son who attends Maurice Cody.

“But everyone in our community was adamant that they wanted to express themselves. It was an amazingly grassroots, passionate meeting. It took a life of its own, I could feel it.”

Beaudin said that it wasn’t out of character for he and his fellow parents to be involved with this level of commitment. “Almost every parent volunteers (at the school) in one capacity or another.”

If the boundaries were redrawn, most kids would be walking only a few hundred metres further, yet it remains a scenario that most at Maurice Cody are unable to accept, said Beaudin.

At the meeting parents offered a list of reasons against redrawing the boundaries, chief among them that their children would be losing a quarter — or about 150 — of their friends and classmates.

The potential safety issue in sending young children across Mt. Pleasant Road. was also raised at the meeting.

“With all the traffic accidents going on it’s a very appropriate time to discuss that,” said Beaudin, who also mentioned the issue of property values.

“Approximately 600 homes in the boundary change area would have a 10-percent drop in value should they be excluded from the Cody catchment,” he said. “We’ve committed to Cody by buying a house here.”

In the crossfire of reactions to the potential plans, the other five schools represented at the meeting were all but silent. In the deals on the table so far, only Maurice Cody stands to lose, said Beaudin.

Matlow agreed but said that the voting process, including members of schools that likely won’t be affected by the future deal, is a good thing.

“I’d far rather have schools that will not be affected at the table than have a decision made that would affect them and then they were never there to participate in that discussion,” he said.

Despite the clear and unified voice against boundary change coming from Maurice Cody, Matlow suggested that the all fervor might end up being for naught.

“It’s far from being a done deal,” he said.

But Beaudin and his community aren’t willing to take the chance.

“We know for a fact that boundary change is an option. It could happen. So it’s up to us to do everything we can as early as possible,” he said.

The process is set to wrap up by the summer, but for now the options are open and, says Matlow, it’s up to the community to speak up. “Parents should take that literally. Imagine what you want and make that recommendation.”

The next committee meeting is scheduled for March 2. At that time Matlow expects that the 11 options will be cut down considerably and that while the decisions are ultimately up to the the committee, he believes they are listening.

“If we are hearing from a community that there is an option that is absolutely unbearable to them that message needs to be taken very seriously,” he said.