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By Dylana Kneeshaw

NEW SCHOOLS NEEDED

Capital needs remain dire in SD73 despite 2026 opening of new school, catchment area shuffle

May 14, 2025 | 4:33 PM

KAMLOOPS — This week, the Kamloops-Thompson School Board approved some adjustments to the existing catchment plan to which schools students living in Sahali and Aberdeen neighbourhoods will be assigned. The changes will take effect in the fall of 2026, at the same time as the opening of the new Sníne Elementary School in Pineview Valley.

The juggling act is all related to the root problem of needing more schools in the city.

Depending on where a family’s home address sits on redrawn catchment area maps, some students will begin the 2026-2027 school year at a brand new elementary school in the Pineview Valley neighbourhood. Superintendent Rhonda Nixon says the new school will ease some of the ongoing overcrowding pressure in the city’s southwest sector, but it’s not a complete solution.

“I think Sníne Elementary does resolve some of our issues, but not all of them,” she told CFJC Today.

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Under the adjusted catchment boundaries, portions of Lower Aberdeen, Cherry Creek, Lac le Jeune and Tobiano will attend Sníne Elementary, while some students in Upper Sahali will head to McGowan Park Elementary instead of Summit Elementary.

“What’s most important is that the Grade 7s do not have to move and nor do the Grade 12s who are in their schools that year for the 2026 year. They don’t have to suddenly be uprooted,” Nixon says.

On the high school side, some students in Lower Aberdeen, Cherry Creek, Lac le Jeune and Tobiano will be headed to Sa-Hali Secondary instead of South Kamloops Secondary. Eight months of consultation were done before the board voted on the catchment plan to go with, but the district says it is still not perfect.

“To be truthful, I mean the big worry is Sa-Hali. Sa-Hali stays at 137 per cent (capacity) approximately. I mean, that is too full. And you know that it has multiple portables outside.”

Even with Sníne alleviating some elementary overcrowding, the capital project priorities haven’t budged. The district points to Kamloops desperately needing a new elementary school in Batchelor Heights, a new secondary school in Aberdeen and a new build for Sun Peaks.

“When we hear the stories of the different communities on the capital plan, they each matter. The one that is most pressing for us just because of numbers and capacity utilization, would be the new school in Aberdeen,” Nixon notes.

This upcoming school year won’t be impacted by catchment area changes and the district expects overcrowding will still be a problem, even after the recently approved catchment changes take effect in fall of 2026.