Petition – Winchester Public School

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Schools and Children

Petition – Winchester Public School

As you may know, the Toronto District School Board is making a decision on Wednesday, November 16th about Ward 14 schools. This includes Winchester Public school and Sprucecourt Public school.

The current recommendation is to turn Winchester into a French Immersion hub from SK-Grade 8 and make Sprucecourt into a JK-8 school. It would also change the catchment areas for your neighbourhood school. There has been a degree of debate about what may happen to Winchester if it becomes a French Immersion hub and what would happen to the JK programme currently in place. You can visit the TDSB website at http://www.tdsb.on.ca/_site/ViewItem.asp?siteid=10118&menuid=32817&pageid=27935 to see slides from past presentations. The Schools Portfolio of the CRA has been working hard on this issue, so please send any questions our way at info@cabbagetowner.com

Two petitions have been created around this issue.

1) Keep JK at Winchester
The TDSB has proposed eliminating the Junior Kindergarten (JK) program at Winchester Public School and is about to make a final decision on the proposal. The difficulties associated with this proposed change include:
a. parents with children already attending Winchester and a younger child entering JK will need to figure out how to manage two school drop-offs and pick-ups at the same time every day.
b. for children affected it will mean adjusting to a new school, its schedule, and students in JK and then again when they transition into SK at Winchester. We believe this change introduces difficult transitions for young children entering the school system, hardship on parents caught juggling children in two separate schools, or children having to miss the opportunity of Junior Kindergarten.
We are asking the TDSB to keep the Junior Kindergarten program at Winchester and have created a petition to send a message of support for JK at Winchester from our community. Please support this cause. To sign the petition go to: http://www.petitiononlinecanada.com/petition/please-keep-junior-kindergarten-at-winchester-ps/491

2) Keep Winchester as a Dual Track (French/English) school
We, the community members of Ward 14 in the TDSB, want to express our dissent regarding the proposed changes to our school, Winchester Jr. and Sr. PS,that have been recommended by the Pupil Accommodation Review Committee (PARC) in Ward 14. They have proposed changing Winchester PS from a dual-track, Community School to a central French Immersion and eliminating JK from Winchester PS and relocating it to Sprucecourt Jr. PS. During the public consultation process of the Pupil Accommodation Review for Ward 14, the community was told by the PARC that keeping Winchester Jr. and Sr. PS as status quo was not a viable option.
We are strongly urging you to please keep Winchester PS the dual-track, JK-8, Community school that so many community members have dedicated time and resources to create. We ask you to withhold any further decisions about changing Winchester for at least another 2 years. There is tremendous support in our community to keep the English track at Winchester PS and make it viable and strong.
PARC has based their decision on current and projected enrollment numbers. The projected number, however, is based upon reducing Winchester’s catchment area and a projected decreased enrollment in the English stream. With active community involvement, the projected numbers need not become a reality. In the past, the community has banded together to save the once-troubled (now flourishing) French Program and can do the same for the English Program, if given the chance.
Winchester Jr. and Sr. PS has a very unique position as a central, community school that serves a neighbourhood that is among the most ethnically, religiously, and economically diverse in the entire TDSB. Winchester’s very existence as a successful Community school is a tangible positive reminder of what makes this city, its communities, and its children so great. To sign the petition go to: http://www.petitiononlinecanada.com/petition/keep-winchester-jr-and-sr-ps-a-dualtrack-community-school/552

1 reply on “Petition – Winchester Public School”

I went to Winchester Public from kindergarden to grade 8, my brother and I have many memorys of
growing up in cabbagetown. I would like the school to remain as it was when we went there,I understand things change but this was the best school in the area. My best friend went there as well, I talked to her about 2 months ago about the school and the good times we had.Well I was in school I worked at the Fudger house and at Murray Drug store on the lunch counter, the men who worked at Wilson’s came down on their break for coffee and to eat. I am going to bring my family to see here I had the best time of my life, I lived on Bleecker Street and then I went to Central Commerce.

I would also like to tell you sum of the teachers I remember, Mr. Mckay,Miss Chambers, Ms. Thomson,Mr Procoff, Ms Marques(sorry about the spelling of names I forgot how they were spelled) Thanks for this walk through my child hood.

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