#SaveLakeside: Community coming together for school

The Lachine-Dorval community is coming together to save their only English high school. The #SaveLakeside movement garnered the support of students, parents and elected officials in Dorval’s Millenium Park on Sunday. About 100 supporters gathered to record the PK Subban Jingle Bells Challenge.

After news broke last week that the Lester B. Pearson School Board had voted to close Lakeside Academy at the end of the academic year, Jennifer Park decided to take action.

“As a parent and a citizen of Dorval, I’m not just going to sit here,” she said. Park’s daughter is in the IB program at Lakeside and her son is in the REACH program at the school. They have changed schools three times.

The group is working to stop the school’s closure and spread the word “that this is not the right decision,” she explained.

“Save Lakeside is going to work really hard for the next two weeks to submit a reconsideration report,” Park said. If a commissioner who voted in favour of closing the school agrees to rescind their vote, a reconsideration can take place at the next board meeting, Jan. 25.

Park is proud that her eighth-grader son was on the honour roll at Lakeside after he had been told in other schools he may not be able to get a diploma. “Lakeside reassured me that no matter what disability he had, he would be able to succeed.”

Friends in high places

The mayor of Lachine, Claude Dauphin, Dorval mayor, Edgar Rouleau, and MNA for Marquette, François Ouimet, were decked in white “#SaveLakeside” t-shirts to support the group, though they’re doing more than just a wardrobe change.

“It’s the only English high school in Dorval and Lachine area, so we’re trying to save the school, like we did for the hospital a couple of years ago,” said Dauphin. He is hoping to help find an alternative, either through a reconsideration vote, or a possible mix of the English and French school boards.

“If we have to mix with the francophone classes, why not? That’s the beauty of Lachine. The francophones and anglophones have lived together for more than 350 years.”

“It will be a big loss, not only for the Anglophone community, but for everyone,” he said. From blood drives to the Teapot senior’s resource centre, the mayor explained that Lakeside students are very involved in the community.

MNA François Ouimet is in talks with the cabinet of the education minister and the Commision scolaire Marguerite Bougeois to have them look at the option of merging French and English schools in the building.

“I went to the demonstration to support the parents, but more than that I told them I would look at every possible option before watching the school board close an important school,” he said.

“I don’t know if it will lead us to a promised land but I want to look at every possible option before a final decision is made.” At times the government can facilitate co-habitation in schools, however the ultimate decision is the school board’s, Ouimet explained.

Lachine’s commissioner for the CSMB, Marie-Josée Boivin, said that the board has begun an analysis to determine the needs of the board.

Lakeside academy was founded in 2001, the product of a merger between Lachine High School and Lachine-Bishop Whelan High School. It is currently at 37 per cent capacity with a 96 per cent success rate.