Students in New West scored Tuesday night when trustees approved the district’s first-ever sports academy.
Come September, a group of young girls and boys at New Westminster Secondary School will participate in a hockey academy offered by the district in partnership with Pacific Rim Hockey Academy.
The academy comes more than a year after trustees passed a motion creating a protocol to develop academies. The new hockey academy, which is open to grades 9 to 12, is unlike extracurricular activities currently offered by the district, in that ice time or dry-land training will be conducted during school hours in the place of traditional physical education classes, superintendent Pat Duncan explained.
“It’s exciting to see it come forward, and I hope that it’s the first of many opportunities for our students to engage in these kinds of learning opportunities,” added Jonina Campbell, chair of New West’s board of education.
Both Campbell and Duncan stressed the hockey academy is not an elite or competitive program, and it’s open to students of all skill levels.
But the program does come at a cost. Students who sign up for the fee-based program will have to fork over $1,224 per year, but that said, there are measures in place to help students who can’t afford to pay through the district’s hardship policy.
“No student will be denied based on finances,” Duncan said. “Anything that we can do that makes school more engaging for students, and that’s exactly what we’re trying to do: develop programs where students are looking forward to coming to school everyday.”
While the academy doesn’t begin until the fall, the district already has an idea of how it’ll look once it starts. Three days per week students from the high school will head over to Queen’s Park Arena for their ice time, and the other days will be spent working on dry land. There will also be an emphasis on fitness, nutrition and leadership, Duncan told the Record.
So far, there are 33 students registered for the academy.
New Westminster joins Port Coquitlam, Squamish, Coquitlam, Whistler and Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows, and municipalities on Vancouver Island who already offer academies.
