Discussion of a community high school hijacked collective meeting

Talk of the need for a local high school dominated a Monday meeting facilitated by Caroline Polgrabia, chair of the Niagara-on-the-Lake Youth Collective’s organizing committee Monday.

The meeting was planned to “identify some priorities for youth programs and advancement in town” over the coming years.

At the NOTL Youth Collective’s campus at Cornerstone Community Church in Virgil, Polgrabia shared a list of five talking points in an email to participants, however, she admitted she knew talk about a high school “was going to dominate the conversation.”

Areas for discussion included planning for the future of education, supporting sport, encouraging creativity, building diversity, equity and inclusion, and transit.

In attendance were members of the community representing arts and culture, sports, education, and town staff, including Lord Mayor Gary Zalepa. Many present were parents with young families. Polgrabia had posted event details on popular local FaceBook groups and on the collective’s social feeds. She had also emailed “anyone who has shared a passion and a connection with the kids.”

The collective’s goal is to provide youth with a safe place to gather, have fun and be inspired. Parents and community members volunteer their unique skill sets, including wood-working, cooking and self-defence. The town has been invested in the collective’s purpose and this year took on the administration of certification programs such as first aid and babysitting.

Even though Polgrabia started the meeting by indicating that “we are bang on with where we expected to be” two years ago when they created a “dedicated central space for NOTL youth to call their own,” she noted that “this isn’t a collective meeting per se, but that the collective constantly gets asked to comment on, or think about wider issues.”

The 18 participants introduced themselves and each spoke briefly about why they attended the meeting. Many parents said they want to see their children come together as a community, or as one parent noted, in a community that is an amalgamation of five distinct areas that “spreads far and wide.”

Nancy Romanowich-McConkey, a kindergarten teacher at Crossroads Public School, noted that their Grade 8 grads go separate ways to attend three different high schools. “I hope their friendships are strong enough that they’ll continue into high school,” she said. She thinks a high school near the Outlet Collection would be a way to keep everyone together.

“Discussions are happening behind the scenes to get a high school back,” said Polgrabia, who mentioned a lengthy coffee chat she and Zalepa had over the issue. Zalepa explained that “there are locales in Glendale where plans indicate possible school sites,” adding as a caveat, “planning is planning. Planning is not purchasing and developing.”

Many residents referenced the surge of development in St. Davids, Glendale and Virgil.

Emily Kujbida, recreation program coordinator for the town, noted that swimming registrations for the town have increased this year by 200 participants.

Carrie Plaskett, a parent on Crossroads school council, president of the soccer club, and the volunteer coordinator for the NOTL Wolves Minor Hockey Association, said that she had compared the last two censuses in preparation for the meeting and that “we have 100 more high school kids than Port Colborne and they have two high schools.”

Don MacDoughall, a retired history teacher at the now-defunct Niagara District Secondary School who campaigned vigorously first to keep it open, then to return high school education to the community, brought to the table the history of the closure of the town’s only public high school.

Polgrabia would like to see a high school in Virgil, an area she sees as central to the entire community. “Crossroads would make a beautiful town hall,” she ventured, and the current town hall could be renovated with an expansion to allow a school facility for Grades JK to 12. Especially enticing, she added, is the proximity of that property to the Centennial Sports Park.

Polgrabia professed that she is not the voice of the community and that her intent in calling the meeting was to focus on what the community is thinking about issues affecting local youth. She believes a lobby group should present a unified proposal to one or both school boards. In a conversation with The Local on Tuesday, Polgrabia said that she, as part of the collective, is “not enamoured at being an advocacy group,” and they are “always looking at a partnership.”

“The purpose of this meeting was to start this conversation,” she said. “Relationship-building needs to happen with the school board,” she added, and “we need to find a balance where everyone can walk away feeling like they’ve won.”

At the end of the two-hour meeting, in which all residents had an opportunity to weigh in on the subject, Polgrabia said “tonight wasn’t meant to stop the problem. If we want something we have to figure out what we want.”

Structured conversation is needed about these and the other issues in the fall, she said. “We could be doing better to connect youth to arts in Niagara-on-the-Lake,” Polgrabia added, who mentioned that the Niagara Pumphouse Arts Centre, Shaw Festival and Yellow Door Theatre Project are important to youth in town.

Equally important are sports opportunities and a reliable transit system to get youth to local games and events.

Erinn Lockard, collective volunteer and owner of Sweets & Swirls Cafe, summed up the evening by saying that “collectively, we can agree that we need to do something to foster the sense of community that youth get from a local high school.”

The conversation will be put on hold for the summer, allowing for the community to start determining “what is the right question that gets us to the right conversation,” concluded Polgrabia. “We need to figure out what the dream youth campus offers and how we bring sport, arts and culture, mental health and education into the conversation. This will get people to where the conversation needs to go.”

When she reconvenes a discussion group in the fall she will invite a larger audience with a more structured format including formalized break-out rooms, she said.

For now, “we are looking forward to everyone having a great summer, focusing on what is important to them.”