The superintendent of the Garden Valley School Division says there hasn't been a month this school year where they haven't experienced some growth.
At the end of September, GVSD reported an enrolment of 4,060 to the province, and since that time, Superintendent Dan wWrd says they have gained around 50 students. As of last week, the enrolment was at 4,110.
Ward says the growth is from a combination of newcomer students and some students that have returned from homeschooling, however, the number of newcomers has definitely had a huge impact.
"There hasn't been a month that's gone by where we haven't experienced some growth," noted Ward. "It seems to be that every week or so we have a new family or two that is moving in, so it's definitely on a growth trajectory."
Ward says the growth is from a combination of newcomer students and some students that have returned from homeschooling, however, the number of newcomers has definitely had a huge impact.
"We have received 162 newcomer students in the 2022/23 school year, which is quite incredible. It's an influx of students. It's certainly exciting to receive this many students." Of those students, 70 come originally from Ukraine.
Although GVSD is seeing newcomer students in their schools throughout the division, Ward says there are a number of schools that are receiving a higher number. Those schools include the Winkler Elementary School, Pine Ridge, and Parkland. Ward noted at W.E.S., around 14 % of the total school enrolment are newcomers, Parkland is around 9 %, and Pine Ridge is 8 %.
In November of 2022, the Province announced an additional $900,000 for intensive newcomer support for students arriving in Manitoba.
GVSD submitted an application to Manitoba Education for funding through the program, and based on discussions with Manitoba Education, Ward says they anticipate funding to be announced for initiatives to support programming for newcomers entering the division this school year.
"We put a grant application together fairly quickly because we knew there were needs, and we submitted that proposal prior to the deadline. And I've been in talks with folks at the Department of Education and we do anticipate that we will receive some funding that will be announced in the coming days for our newcomer students. So our proposal was for some additional staffing, some support, some critical areas that our schools need a little bit more help with in terms of supporting newcomer students that speak a language other than English coming in."
Ward notes the ELA students arrived with varying levels of English proficiency, but there's definitely some additional support that's required.
Enrolment is something that is kept a very close eye on, and Ward noted GVSD is already getting started on projections for the upcoming fall.