After a number of discussions about the practice in past meetings, Tuesday was the night New West Schools had its first hybrid meeting. It began with a few echoes and technological hiccups, but those were fixed within minutes.

Below, we’ve compiled some of the meeting’s highlights.

Another middle school coming?

A report presented to the school board on Tuesday evening noted the district was “very excited to have been supported to move forward on a possible site acquisition for [the] purpose of building a new middle school.”

The report notes there is no specific site right now, nor is there any money tied to the potential project, but that the district was looking at a location in the city’s West End. This site would join the likes of Fraser River Middle School and Ecole Glenbrook Middle School.

“Note that this is a request for the acquisition of land only,” the report notes, adding that the Ministry of Education would need another submission that would include a business case.

“[The Ministry of Education has] seen the numbers, they have seen the pressures,” elaborated secretary-treasurer Bettina Ketcham.

The district promises to work closely with the City and the Ministry of Education on this file.

The land acquisition still needs to be approved, but the bylaw connected to bringing this middle school a step closer to reality will be brought to the April 25 board meeting.

Queen Elizabeth expansion delayed

The Queensborough elementary school’s expansion is unfortunately going through some setbacks and is now delayed, with an opening of the expansion in the 2025-2026 school year.

“We’re looking to narrow down that time frame in the coming months, once we nail down milestones … we’ll come back with updates in the coming weeks and months,” said Ketcham.

“The complexity of construction includes planning for a large expansion on a constrained (small) site and geo-technical challenges that include the schools’ [sic] location within the Fraser River flood plain,” the report notes, adding that this means further analysis will need to be done to ensure safety and design optimization.

“The logistics of that are challenging…the site is on a bog, and below a floodplain,” noted Ketcham.

There will be 13 more classrooms added to the building by the time the work is done.

Policy 7—board operations

For the uninitiated, this policy refers to how the board works; this includes related logistics like public engagement and participation, meeting schedules, and comments and questions.

Some of the clarifications included:

• Using Robert’s Rules of Order to keep discussion and decision-making going in an orderly manner during a board meeting, and not, as the policy manual now outlines, “for more experienced participants to frustrate participation by others.”

• There are some new housekeeping-related notes regarding when it comes to school trustees letting the district know that they aren’t able to attend a meeting.

• Clarifications regarding when the oath of office should happen once elections are done.

• Comment and question periods for the public: there will be one at the beginning of board meetings, and one at the end.

• On the matter of correspondence: if someone submits written correspondence by noon on the Monday of the week before the date of the regular board meeting, and it refers specifically to an agenda item, it’ll be “considered on the agenda under ‘correspondence.’”

• Anything that doesn’t make the aforementioned cut-off will be circulated to trustees.

No changes were made to the notes presented by Supt. Karim Hachlaf, and the board approved them.

Other bits and bobs: demolition, vape detectors, budget survey

The demolition process for the old New West Secondary School is slated to be finished by this fall. Dave Crowe, the director of capital projects, noted that the process was about 40% completed.

“You’re going to start to see increased traffic on the site, in terms of trucks coming and going on the site…trucks taking away the debris,” he said during Tuesday evening’s meeting.

The deconstruction of the old Pearson wing started last week, while Crowe added that the old Massey wing is pretty much completed.

About 95% of furniture-related materials in the old school have been salvaged and repurposed in other school districts. This included lockers, desks, and other furnishings. Crowe says they’re trying to figure out what to do with the building’s old beams, though some are slated to head to the United States.

On the planning side, there were recent portable permits sent off for Fraser River Middle School (one portable), Herbert Spencer (one portable) and Queen Elizabeth Elementary (two portables).

Vape detectors have been installed in the gender-neutral washrooms at NWSS, along with cameras; the camera installation comes after the New West Teacher’s Union endorsed the move last year.

When a vape detector goes off, principals and vice-principals receive an email notifying them.

“We’ll see how well they work, and they’ve been implemented in the gender-neutral washrooms, so the two washrooms on the ground floors. Depending on how they work we can look at other washrooms as well,” said Matt Brito, director of facilities and operations. “There’s sensors, there’s adjustments that can be made on it … it also detects vandalism, so if someone hits the vape detector, it can go off. We tried to work over Spring break to make adjustments so it wouldn’t be so sensitive,” he noted, after trustee Gurveen Dhaliwal asked about the device’s sensitivity.

“In my opinion, it’s working, it’s curbed some of the vaping … I feel,” he added.

The next stage of the budget, which includes consultation, is now open to the public. As of Tuesday night, community members, staff, parents, and guardians can now fill out this seven-minute survey, which will stay open until Friday, April 21.

The next meeting of the school board is set to take place on April 25, and is a regular open board meeting.