COLD LAKE - Northern Lights Public Schools (NLPS) in the Cold Lake area have been going through a three-year configuration plan to address over-populated schools and schools that will reach capacity in the near future. The transition process for the six schools in the area that are a part of the changes was reached by the Cold Lake Configuration Committee, made up of parents and staff, over the last few years.
The configuration process which will be completed in 2024, will add and remove grades from the six Cold Lake schools to address the more than 2,638 students NLPS expects to have enrolled in the Cold Lake area by the 2022/2023 school year.
Not only is this process shifting students and staff around, but it’s also opening up opportunities for students to get involved in the changes that will shape their schools. This fall, a student-led focus group took the initiative to create a survey for students from three schools to select a new name for Cold Lake Middle School (CLMS).
Neveigh Forster, a Nelson Heights Grade 7 student who will be attending CLMS next year explained the idea for the survey to school trustees at a public meeting last week.
“We feel that next year is very important for us as we transition to Cold Lake Middle School…One of the suggestions that the focus group had was to change the name of the school. They provided several excellent suggestions. They felt strongly however that the students should be able to participate in suggesting and selecting a name for the school.”
Students presented 181 suggestions said Tiana Janzen a current Grade 8 student at CLMS.
“After the week of brainstorming ended, we reviewed all of the names and shortlisted four which were suggested most often and or where appropriate as a long-term name for our 7 to 9 school in our community. Those names were Cold Lake Junior High, Eagle Junior High, Kinosoo Junior High or Northern Lights Junior High.”
After another two weeks of online voting that wrapped up recently, Cold Lake Junior High School was the student favourite.
“At the close of voting, Cold Lake Junior High received 111 votes; Kinosoo Junior High had 41 votes; Eagle Junior High had 23, and then Northern Light Junior High had 21,” said Janzen.
The statistics from the online vote showed that almost 900 visits were made to the survey page and 225 active engagements were recorded. The response was so big that students are planning to do more surveys to find new names for school sports teams, a school mascot, a school slogan and the school’s student common area.
NLSD School Board decision
The process to change a name of an existing school must go through a specific administrative procedure including board approval and public engagement, said Paula Elock, Secretary-Treasurer at NLPS. With the recent school presentation to the board, the public consultation process is expected to follow an official approval by trustees at a future meeting.
“Once the school picks a name, then it comes to the board to endorse and then goes out for public consultations for a month after that,” explained Elock.
Staff and students at CLMS decided to put forward the top two names—Cold Lake Junior high and Kinosoo—for the board and public to decide on.
“Kinosoo, it reads a bit as a historical connotation to our area and it actually was the name of the lake Cold Lake…I think both will be very respectable, also meaningful and reflective of our community, said the school's principal Chan Cusson. “I think the community has a vested interest in naming our school also… we would be satisfied with one or the other. The community feedback that comes back for either one, we will be good with that.”
Supporting Cold Lake schools
The process for the re-configuration of Cold Lake schools has been ongoing for the last three years. NLPS Superintendent Rick Cusson said it’s good to see the project nearing completion. It’s also been good to see the working support of the community, staff, students and administration throughout the process.
“The administration of the buildings, the administration team of the school division and most importantly the teachers, and the students keep progressing on things that happen every day.
When you take a look at the configuration in Cold Lake, we had committed to parents that we were going to start moving forward on a three-year-plan,” he said, explaining that even with unforeseen challenges, the plan has moved ahead. “Not only are they doing this from my perspective in a fairly effective manner; they’re doing this in the middle of a pandemic.”
Moving forward, all school name suggestions will be tabled at a future board meeting and brought back with consideration for the efforts, and requests from the students and staff in Cold Lake.
