The replacement for Mount Baker Secondary School, in the form of a new “Neighbourhood Learning Centre,” is a number one capital priority in School District 5, and on Wednesday the number one topic of conversation for Margaret MacDiarmid.

The B.C. Minister of Education was in the East Kootenay on Wednesday, April 7, touring several schools in the district, including MBSS and Kootenay Orchards Elementary in Cranbrook, in the company of East Kootenay MLA Bill Bennett.

The students at MBSS took MacDiarmid on a tour of the school. “They were on fire,” the minister said. “They are really articulate young people telling me about their school and what’s going on. That’s a real highlight for me, meeting great students and teachers and educators from across the province.

“I saw some beautiful plans, actually, that the students have come up with — their concepts of ‘Neighbourhoods of Learning.’ They’ve got all kinds of ideas of what it could look like.”

As well as touring schools in Jaffray, Fernie and Sparwood, MacDiarmid was to meet with the Board of Trustees on Wednesday night.

“I’m sure that (the proposed neighbourhood learning centre in Cranbrook) will be a topic of conversation that’s a top priority, we understand that.

“We’re not going to be making any announcements while we’re here,” MacDiarmid cautioned. “But the way we do that kind of development across the province is we look at all of the top priorities — we’ve got 60 school districts that we need to look at.”

Not until the province brings out its new capital plan will any such announcement be made. MacDiarmid added she couldn’t say when that would be.

“I think the project is under $50 million — I think that’s the pricetag (for the new Cranbrook school). And we currently are not announcing the capital plan. But of course there’ll be new capital for schools.

“This is the top priority for the district, and when we have another capital plan to announce, then we’ll have a better feeling for it. We have to look at things like the age of buildings, also the need for space for students. We have some districts — not this district — that are growing very rapidly and exploding out the space that exists.

“But of course there’ll be new capital for schools.”

Neighbourhood Learning Centres, as they’re now dubbed, is the current philosophy as far as school development goes in B.C.

“What we’re trying to do now with all the replacement schools, new schools and even some schools they’re putting additions on, is to have neighbourhood learning centres where we incorporate elements from the community,” MacDiarmid said. “The school is already the hub of the community for lots of people, but the neighbourhood learning centres that are being developed now are having senior centres, daycares, health facilities, libraries, theatres — all kinds of different facilities that add to the school. The school will then be in use much more in the day, the evening and the weekend — you use the space better, it’s environmentally better.

“A lot of thought has been put into it, and it is the way forward.”

Enrolment in B.C. has been undergoing a decline since the early 1990s. But MacDiarmid says the demographics are slowly shifting, and that by 2013 or 2014, depending on the area, for most of the province there will start to be a slow increase in enrolments. With the advent of Full-Day Kindergarten, which is being phased in starting in September, and full-day education, play-based learning for four-year-olds, new or enhanced school space will be even more of a priority. The new programs will also ease the decline in enrolments.

“Certainly, having full-day Kindergarten and all-day learning for four-year-olds will expand the number of students we’re educating,” MacDiarmid said.