Student enrolment in School District 58 is down just 9.6 full-time equivalent (FTE) students from last year, one of the lowest declines in student enrolment the district has seen in 10 years.

SD58 was also above its projected enrolment total of 2,055 students (including distance and alternate program students) by 74 with 2,129.2, SD58 Secretary-Treasurer Kevin Black told the Herald.

Last year’s number of students at the start of September was 2,138.8, Black said.

Black said the numbers would be higher if they were based purely on head count instead of FTE. Students enrolled in Grade 8 and up have their enrolment based on the number of courses they’re in, meaning a student who doesn’t have a full course load wouldn’t count as one student, which is why FTE numbers include fractions.

Black said a single course represents 1/8 of the full-time course load, so a student enrolled in one course would count as 0.125 in the FTE count.

Black said student enrolment has been decreasing in SD58 for the past decade, estimating a loss of about 1,000 students in that time span.

In 2000-2001, SD58 had 3,100 students compared to the 2,130 they have enrolled this year. Black also said that SD58 had an enrolment decrease of about 175 student from 2011-12 to 2012-13. The year before that, the school district had a decrease of 140 students. Between 2009-10 and 2010-11, there was no change. The district saw a decrease of 65 students between the 2008-09 and 2009-10 school years.

“Having the enrolment remain steady is a good thing for the district because it means there are potentially positive signs we’re going the other way, and we’ve been steadily declining,” Black said.

He said when doing projections for enrolment, the school district typically swaps the number of Grade 12 students leaving with the estimated number of incoming kindergarten students.

In Merritt, Central Elementary has the highest enrolment among elementary schools with 267 students. Diamond Vale comes next with 182, followed by Bench Elementary with 170 students, Nicola-Canford with 160 and Collettville Elementary with 146 students.

Diamond Vale Elementary had the largest decrease amongst Merritt’s elementary schools with 18 fewer students than last year and Central Elementary had the largest increase with 19.

Merritt’s only high school, Merritt Secondary School, has an enrolment of 625.3, which dropped by 30.53 students from last year’s enrolment of 655.87 in September.

Black said it’s good to see that this year’s decline is small compared to student enrolment declines in previous years, especially given that SD58 is in funding protection.

With funding protection, the school district is only funded 98.5 per cent of the dollars from the previous year so with continually declining enrolment, the school district loses 1.5 per cent of their funding protection each year, Black said.

Over the past couple of years, the district has lost about $350,000 per year in their operating budget, Black said.

SD58 received $2.26 million in 2012-13 in funding protection and their overall budget was $24,049,000 – the amount it cannot receive less than 98.5 percent of.

For the 2013-14 school year, the funding protection is projected to be about $2 million because the district has more students than projected.

Black said each student brings in $6,900 in support from the provincial government, which is why funding protection has been important to the district when enrolment has declined.

SD58 pilots student trustees

Four high school students in School District 58 are getting a chance to be the voice of their peers on the school board.

The student trustees — two from Merritt Secondary School and two from Princeton Secondary School — cannot bring motions forward and are non-voting members, but they are allowed to submit ideas and add agenda items as well as participate in discussions and debate, Black said.

“The goal is that they’ll bring forward the student voice, and let us know if we’re missing anything and inform the board of the student voice,” Black said.

Emily Maloney and Mackenzie Finch will be the Merritt-based representatives in the one-year pilot project.

The school board alternates its monthly meetings between Merritt and Princeton.