Re-Inventing Blyth - Again!

It seems clear now that Blyth Public School is doomed.


No manner of argument, debate, discussion, pleading caused even a ripple of interest or concern in the Avon Maitland District School Board. The board's feeble gestures of consultation and review of the process of closing schools have so far proven to be empty pretences and false imitations of democratic community consideration.


Closing the school in a community tears the heart out of that community. As an educator, I am sure that the closure will have a negative effect on the education of our children. The long term effects on the community are daunting. They could include loss of businesses, reduced property values, loss of inflow of young families who will shy away from a community with no school for their children. The presence of a vacated school has the same effect as a business district with many vacant retail buildings; it could be seen by many people as a sign of a dying community.

Blyth will survive. Our children will get an education of sorts. But the village will be diminished. We will not forget the sense of abandonment when we recall what the school board, people who were supposed to represent us, did to us, and the fact that the majority of our own municipal council turned their backs on us in the end. Well at least we have a little better idea of where we stand.

Most disappointing is the fact that only a small fraction of members of the community showed up to express their outrage at this attack on our community.

What we need to do now is figure out what we can do to overcome the loss that we are about to experience. We need ideas, creativity, and lots of discussion to come up with a vision of new Blyth. We need dozens of ideas to be discussed, studied, compared, evaluated, weighed, until we come up with a handful of great prospects from which we can choose one or two or three that stand out as WINNERS! Along the way we may come up with a few additional ideas which will be easy to implement, not too demanding of time and energy, and which will contribute to the new community.

By referring to the "new Blyth", I am not implying that we throw away what we already have. We must build on those great assets that we have developed and fostered.