Students are without heat in some Surrey school portables, teachers’ association says

As temperatures begin to drop, teachers and parents in Surrey are voicing concerns that many students are learning in the cold.

Laurie Larson with the Surrey Board of Education says there have been around 55 new or relocated portables added in Surrey in recent weeks, and several remain without heat.

“The growth in Surrey has not been matched to the building of the schools, and it takes almost five years once a plan has been approved to actually get that school built and ready for use,” Larson told CityNews. “So we’re already five years behind (and we are) not even going to count that we figure we’re going to have another 3,000 students next year.”

The Surrey Teachers’ Association complained to the district when it started to get colder last month.

“This question of heat — too much in the summer, too little now — is on top of all the other issues: not enough support for students, overcrowded classrooms, bad ventilation, all those things,” said Lizanne Foster, the association’s vice-president.

“We had teachers frantically calling us telling us that they have to wear jackets and sweaters, the kids are freezing, they’re wearing gloves in the classroom.”

Sash Khanna is the parent of a high school student who is learning in a heatless portable.

“We all know November is cold, right?” Khanna said. “If they knew there were this many portables, and if the portables were installed by mid-October, what has taken the district so long to keep the heat going in the portables?”

The Surrey School District says it has hired additional contractors to take care of the situation, but it’s going to take a few weeks to fix the problem. It estimates the issue should be resolved by Nov. 17.

In the meantime, the teachers’ association says they have brought space heaters into the portables, but they say this isn’t enough, and if it gets too cold, the students will have to move inside the actual school, where it is already overcrowded.

Both teachers and parents like Khanna say regardless of the heat or no heat, portables are a band-aid solution, and they’re still waiting for a concrete expansion plan to address the overpopulated schools.