At the Board meeting of March 4, 2015, Trustees of the Halton District School Board approved expanding the Grade 1 Core French program by an additional 15 schools, 5 of which are located in Oakville, starting in September 2015.
The following public schools in Oakville will implement 40 minutes per week of Grade 1 Core French beginning in September: Brookdale, Gladys Speers, New Central, River Oaks, and North East Oakville #1.
In September 2014, 24 schools began providing Grade 1 Core French, based on a motion approved by Trustees in November 2013. With the approval of this motion, Trustees approved to expand the primary Core French program to an additional minimum of 12, up to 15 elementary schools to start in September of this year.
The following considerations were discussed by Family of Schools Superintendents and the Associate Director as schools to begin Grade 1 Core French in the 2015-2016 school year including:
- Schools in four geographic areas of the Halton District School Board
- Single Track English schools (9), Dual Track schools (4) and new schools (2)
- School organization: JK-Grade 8 (7), JK-Grade 6 (5), JK-Grade 5 (3)
- Large and small school populations
- Previous up-take rate for Grade 1 French Immersion
- September 2014 Grade 1 English – French enrolments
- Number of new initiatives in the school
The increase to 15 schools brings the total to 39 Halton District School Board elementary schools providing primary Core French in Grade 1. This represents slightly more than half of those schools able to accommodate this program. An annual review of this program will be brought to Trustees at the end of the school year. An interim report will be brought to the trustees in November 2015 regarding this year’s roll out.
“We are excited to increase the opportunity for students to be exposed to Core French beginning in Grade 1,” said Stuart Miller, Associate Director of Education for the Halton District School Board.