LARRY’S RIVER — The new building hosting Guysborough County’s first French language school, in the Acadian enclave of Larry’s River, will be open for classes before the end of the month, the provincial government confirmed in an email to The Journal.
“We are very excited about the progress being made on the new Conseil scolaire acadien provincial (CSAP) École Belle-Baie,” said Krista Higdon, a spokesperson with Communications Nova Scotia, last week. “We expect the school to be ready for students by the end of September.”
When complete, she added, the $5-million edifice – paid for under the province’s school capital program – will be “made up of five modular classrooms and an administrative space housed adjacent to the Larry’s River community centre [and] will have space for more than 125 students from grades pre-primary to grade 10.”
The school – which formally launched a year ago in the community centre’s “learning space” – has approximately 22 students, but that number is expected to grow, according to École Belle-Baie Principal Nicole Bell-Avery.
“I think with a permanent structure, there will be many more parents interested,” she told The Journal recently. “This [schoolhouse] will become the hub of this community.”
The building is the latest phase in what’s been a long, parent-led and CSAP-supported campaign to ensure that public education is available in the French language for students living in the traditionally Acadian area, including the neighbouring communities of Tor Bay, Charlos Cove and Port Felix – and nearby ones.
“We’ve been working very hard at preserving our culture over a number of years.” Jude Avery, president of La Société Acadienne de Torbé,” recently told The Journal. “To [do this] without the language [being taught] is a difficult road, and, so, this [schoolhouse] will give us another tool in the toolbox to do just that.”
In the meantime, Higdon said, CSAP has signed a lease with the community centre [in Larry’s River] to continue using it as a learning space until the new school is complete. Overall, the [province’s school capital] plan is investing more than $1 billion in building new schools, as well as maintaining existing ones.
