staple of the community for close to 100 years, Satinwood School celebrated its last spring after Wolf Creek Public Schools (WCPS) chose to shut down the school for good.
SATINWOOD SCHOOL
Like many other rural schools in central Alberta, Satinwood was closed due to shortfalls in funding and low enrolment. As of this year, Satinwood was over budget by $40,000. With the public school system estimating their average per pupil operational funding to be $10,111, just four more students would have kept the school open.
“We’ve had our ups and downs, but we were showing some really positive feedback from people who were going to come into the community,” McPherson said. “We’re quite disappointed in Wolf Creek for not sticking it through.”
Larry Jacobs, superintendent of WCPS, said the board had gone out of their way to make sure extra funding was in place to give Satinwood a fighting chance, but in the end, it wasn’t enough.
“We had additional funding in place to give the community an opportunity to see if there was something else they could do,” Jacobs explained. “We waited for two or three years to see if that was going to work, but it didn’t.”
But parents and community groups had trouble believing the school board had thoroughly exhausted all options before closing what had grown to be a historical landmark in the community.
“We were trying to get across to the school board that we could fundraise, we could get donations, but their policy didn’t allow that,” McPherson added. “We just didn’t see that they (WCPS) put their nose to the grindstone to help us.”
Superintendent Jacobs said because of the delicate nature of things like school closures, sometimes it’s difficult for the community to understand that there comes a point in time when there’s truly nothing else that can be done.
“Communities really struggle with this and so they should,” Jacobs said. “Boards are caught in a very difficult conundrum. Sometimes to support a smaller school as the numbers go down, it takes more and more funds from other schools in the division.”
Despite the community rallying together to keep the school open, the fate of Satinwood School was sealed. And while kids are already hopping on new buses to new schools this year, the memories made in the little building tucked away in the grain-dusted hills of the prairies won’t soon be forgotten.
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Satinwood alumni Jackie McPherson said her family saw four generations pass through the beloved little school, and was crushed her 7-year-old daughter Morgan only got to spend one year there. To many like McPherson, Satinwood was a place where everybody knew everybody, and was a true hub of the community.
“It was just the best school,” McPherson said. “Something about it makes it warm in your heart that this is home, this is your second family. A part of me is worried when the school is gone, that will be gone.”
Parent Jackie McPherson and WCPS superintendent Larry Jacobs share their views surrounding the closure of Satinwood School.
 Satinwood: Early 1900s |
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 Satinwood: 1920 |
 Satinwood: 1958 |
 Satinwood: 1976 |