Funding for renovations casts doubt on future of SAMS
Malcolm Gorrill
Northern News Services
Inuvik (Feb 23/01) - Lack of funds for needed renovations to Sir Alexander Mackenzie school worries Mary Beckett.
Beckett, chair of the Inuvik District Education Authority, said according to the capital standards used by the Government of the Northwest Territories, SAMS is eligible for renovation rather than replacement.
Beckett said the government's preliminary estimate indicates the total cost of a complete renovation of the school would be around $16.5 million. But the government is unwilling to spend more than about $9.7 million.
"So our current issue is to try to find a way to renovate the whole school," Beckett said.
"If we're unsuccessful, it could mean that a portion of the school was removed from the community's ability to use it. It might even be torn down," she said.
"I can't see us operating with a school half the size of SAMS."
Over the next year the GNWT will devise plans for the SAMS renovation, with construction to follow.
Beckett said the school, which is roughly 40-years-old, needs work. She said part of the problem is the capital standards. When the total student population (about 785 as of Sept. 30, 2000), and the total square footage of SAMS and Samuel Hearne are combined, they are rated as being about 57 per cent occupied.
That would suggest about 40 per cent of the two schools is not used.
Beckett strongly disagrees. She said that due to the new Kindergarten and Grade 1 initiative passed recently by the Beaufort-Delta Education Council, four more classrooms will be needed at SAMS this fall.
Beckett said that'll take up pretty much all the space that's left there.
She said that in some classrooms, especially at Samuel Hearne, there might be only five or 10 students at a time. She pointed out that two subjects can't be taught simultaneously in the same classroom just to increase occupancy.
Entire renovation
Beckett belongs to a committee formed last fall by Mayor Peter Clarkson to study the SAMS renovations, proposed renovations at Samuel Hearne and the new Aurora College campus scheduled to be built here.
Beckett said Samuel Hearne is scheduled to be renovated, but not right away.
She said money for all three capital projects will be drawn from one overall budget.
"The total budget's somewhere between $28-30 million."
By the end of March the committee will recommend funding priorities regarding the three projects to the Department of Education, Culture and Employment.
"From the point of view of the DEA, we want to see SAMS entirely renovated," Beckett said. "What we'll likely have to do to achieve that is find some partnerships that will allow us to bring in additional funding."
"We're a growing community right now, with the economy starting to rebuild," Beckett said. "I don't see why we should throw away a resource like the school."
