Well, it's happened. The day so many people hoped and prayed would never come, has. On Tuesday night the Thames Valley Board voted to close the Norwich District High School, 9-3. This community has fought for six years to keep their school open, having rallies, bake sales--fundraisers of all types, putting up signs, taking out ads, renting halls for meetings, making submissions to the various committees of the Board. In short, they have worked tirelessly for the survival of their community school.
And in the end it was all for nought. Last Tuesday night the two representatives from Norwich Township stunned their constituents by moving and seconding the motion to close the school. I can only think that some posturing and plotting took place behind closed doors for them to betray those who had elected them. To me it seems they could have voted against the motion just to keep the peace. It would still have passed. And I'm sure they knew that before the vote was ever taken.
Now those of you who don't know the history or the record of this school probably wonder what all the fuss is about. You see, it is not just the small schools of Ontario that are being systematically closed, the students swallowed up by monolithic city schools. A way of life is being threatened. The very ability of parents to nurture their kids in their own setting is disappearing. These students know all the people in their community. Many of them currently take after-school jobs in the Norwich area. Others work in local businesses for school credits, gaining insight into the adult world around them. This link will be severed. And what of the businesses where these students spend their dollars at lunch and after school? They will be hurt, dependent as they are on the student market. I would not be surprised to see more than one forced to close.
Most importantly, the students will lose their community identity as they are bused to the various surrounding city schools and become small fish in big ponds. They won't even be all together in one other school. Their uniqueness will erode.
As a teenager I experienced this myself, riding an hour each way on the bus to Woodstock Collegiate. (Take about wasting time!) Don't get me wrong. I liked my school and am proud to have gone there, but I remember the outcast feeling we kids from the 'country' were made to feel. Being from the farm was not considered good. Never mind that my father was very successful both in farming and in local politics. We were still 'outsiders'. Less, in some way, than the city kids.
On the positive side, these students will have more course choices, particularly the ones who shy away from the maths and sciences. They will be able to take senior level Music and Art, Sociology-type courses--those courses for the more artsy types. And the math/science geeks will have more choice for their specialties. I only hope that Norwich Township's loss will in some way be mitigated by a broader education for our young people.
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This is a sad day indeed. One of the best things about going to NDHS for high school was the fact that it was so small (about 400 students) that everyone really did get to know each other. We didn't have the strong cliques that I hear the bigger schools did. Sure, we found groups of friends to hang around with, but when it came time to party on the weekend we were all there together, smoker guy next to straight A student girl. Not one of us was "better" than the other. I liked that about Norwich. I fear in a bigger schools some students may get lost...and high school is not a time in our lives when that's a good place to be. So sad!
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