Enrolment stabilizes across N.S. schools but growth continues in Halifax and Francophone board

The growing enrolment at Halifax schools is putting a strain on classroom capacity.

Student enrolment across most of Nova Scotia’s public schools has stabilized and in some areas, has even declined.

But that’s not the case in Halifax or within the province’s French-language school board. Both continue to see strong growth which continues to put a strain on classroom capacity.

Since 2017, the Halifax Regional Centre for Education (HRCE) has added roughly 11,000 students, bringing total enrolment to more than 60,000.

To keep pace, HRCE has relied heavily on temporary solutions like the installation of 157 modular classrooms and 53 portables.

“Since 2017, HRCE has received eight new schools across HRM, with plans to build 11 more in the coming years,” said Steven Gallagher, executive director of HRCE.

Gallagher said there’s no evidence that modular classrooms have negatively affected student learning.

The province said those modulars are only a stopgap while it works to expand and build new schools across the region and the province.

“The use of modulars has been intended to augment the square footage that we have, and to solve our immediate [capacity] problem,” said Tracey Barbrick, the deputy minister for the department of education and early childhood development and advanced education.

Since 2022, Nova Scotia has boosted its school construction and maintenance budget to $30 million annually, that’s up sharply from $6 million budgeted under the previous Liberal government.

That total doesn’t include money for new school builds said Barbrick, as the province is looking at building 19 new or replacement schools, with 13 planned for the Halifax region.

But Barbrick said slower growth this year gives the province an opportunity to catch up with the construction but it doesn’t impact the plan.

“That gives us a little bit of a breather to catch up,” said Barbrick.

The Conseil Scolaire Acadien Provincial (CSAP), which serves French-speaking students, recorded the province’s fastest enrolment growth this year, with a 3.2 per cent increase.

“As we keep recruiting doctors, nurses, and teachers from around the world, those numbers will increase,” said Michel Collette, CSAP’s Executive Director.

CSAP officials say more Francophone schools would help attract and retain even more students.

Meanwhile it looks like slower growth ahead for all regions, as Halifax’s numbers surged during the pandemic it appears enrollment numbers will taper off.

HRCE added 500 new students this year, well below the 1,600 it had projected originally.

Gallagher says new federal immigration caps are slowing population growth and is forcing the school system to revise its long-term enrolment projections.

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