The group Canadian Parents for French in Alberta (CPF) is disappointed by a decision made by Rocky View Schools (RVS) to not offer French Immersion to students and families that choose online learning in one of the two new online schools for this fall.  

Last week, staff of the group, along with RVS parents with students in French Immersion programs joined an online discussion to voice their concerns that the division will not be offering French Immersion in the online schools but only through in-classroom learning.  

CPF President Michael Tryon said they have received significant feedback from parents about that decision. 

Some of the major concerns include that parents were not consulted before the division made the decision, the time frame for parents to decide on the learning context for their children next year was extremely limited and must be made by May 31, and that the closure of the Alberta Distance Learning Centre set for June will leave options for French immersion students to take courses via distance education within RVS.

Tryon said the decision forces parents to choose between allowing their children to continue in French Immersion or having them learn in an environment in which the health and safety of their family comes first.

He said it would have been easy for RVS to communicate more effectively.

"The district has the ability to communicate directly with every parent that has children registered within the district.  They can do it directly, they can do it through the schools.  They could have provided online feedback opportunities, they could have gone through school councils to have conversations that way.  They could have had an online public meeting where people could have gone in, provided their feedback, and school division could have explained the situation that way and gone from there."

Tryon said there was no communication with the parents of the French Immersion community at all.  For its part, RVS doesn't see it that way. 

The division said it offered an opportunity for feedback to all parents, students and teachers in the RVS online program this year when developing plans for next year. 

They said that, by all indications, the online program will be much smaller next year, about half of the 3,000 students who attended because of the pandemic this year, which makes it necessary to focus their efforts on regular programming.  

A statement sent to Discover Airdrie by RVS Director of Communications  Tara de Weerd states:

"On May 11 RVS announced details about our online offerings for 2021/22. The letter provided links to more information and provided details on the deadline for registration. In the parent package, we said that, “to develop these two schools successfully, the focus will be on regular programing; French Immersion or Faith-Based will no longer be offered online but will continue to be offered through face-to-face programming at designated schools.” 

With over 3000 students registered for online in 2020/21 we were able to offer French Immersion (FI) for grades 1-9 and we attempted to offer it at grades 10-12. In grades 1-9 we had enough to offer one homeroom per grade of FI. At high school, in semester one we had to combine multiple grades to offer FI. In the second semester, the numbers were so low we could not realistically offer the classes and struggled to find an interested staff member to teach. 

Based on the feedback we received from over 1,100 surveys of online learners, families and staff, total enrolment online in 2021/22 is anticipated to be less than half of what it was this year. If our FI online numbers dropped by half at the grade 1-9 levels, then we would not have sufficient numbers to offer the program. With that, we decided to focus our efforts on regular programming in 2021/22. In subsequent years, we may be able to expand our online offerings and consider introducing programs of choice if enrolment numbers are high enough to make them viable.

While we are not offering an online option for FI next year, we continue to believe strongly in the FI program and invest in the FI program throughout our FI schools."

Michael Tryon said all of the group's French Immersion students have been in the program since kindergarten and it would be heartbreaking for them not to be able to continue. 

He added they want students to be safe but still allowed to continue French immersion.  Parents have until May 31 to make, what he calls, "a very difficult decision" about whether they'll continue with French Immersion in Rocky View next year.  

As of the 2019/2020 school year, 46,636 Alberta students were in French immersion or 6.3 percent of the total student population. 

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