ENTERPRISE - Enterprise may spend up to $100,000 for a feasibility study on establishing a kindergarten to Grade 3 school in the community.

The idea of a school has been around for years in the small community of about 90 people. It has never had a school. Instead, students travel 38 kilometres to Hay River to attend classes.

Enterprise Mayor Dave Richards stands next to the settlement's school bus, which carries students to Hay River. - Paul Bickford/NNSL photo

At a public meeting last year, a $100,000 feasibility study was suggested as one way to spend Enterprise's $634,000 share of the GNWT's Community Capacity Building Fund.

However, Mayor Dave Richards said no final decision has been made on whether such a study will go ahead.

"We're going to explore it. Quite honestly, we're going to be careful how we spend that $100,000," he said.

Coun. Don Ironside said all community members will be contacted to see what they think.

"What we want to make sure is if the community really wants it," he said.

Richards said some residents would like to have a one-classroom, one-teacher school sometime in the future.

The school would likely only have three to six students, he said. "We have some younger kids coming up in three years."

Richards said some parents don't like sending smaller children on the bus to Hay River.

"I think that's the main concern," he said.

Children have to get up at about 6:30 a.m. to be ready to catch the bus at about 7:30 a.m. for the ride to Hay River.

Currently, 14 schoolchildren ride the bus, which is operated by the Settlement of Enterprise.

Four other students go to Hay River daily with their parents. Three students from Enterprise attend kindergarten to Grade 3.

Richards said a number of issues would have to be considered in a feasibility study.

Among the issues are social interactions in a small school compared to a larger one; access to extracurricular activities such as swimming and field trips; and meeting special needs of students.

"There are so many things to look at," Richards said.

Not all parents in Enterprise support the idea of a school in the community.

"To be honest, I'm not that crazy about it," said Michelle Carswell, who has a son attending Grade 1 and a daughter in Grade 4 in Hay River.

Carswell said she wouldn't want to exclude her children from activities such as swimming and figure skating in Hay River.

"I want them to be with their friends," she said. "I think social interaction is just as important as academics."

Carswell thinks Enterprise is luckier than other small NWT communities because it is close to the schools of a larger centre.

As for her children having to catch the school bus at 7:30 a.m., she said, "That's early, but that's also a fact of life."

Carswell said it is not unlike children growing up on isolated farms and having to get up early to take a bus to school in a nearby town.