In the end, the Duntroon that said goodbye to its public school last Saturday was much the same as the one that built it 48 years ago – a close-knit, community-minded, rural hamlet where many families have known each other for generations.
With nearly 400 current and former residents packed standing-room only into the Duntroon Central Public School gymnasium, a succession of speakers asked for several shows of hands – from former graduates, from former faculty members, from those who were students at one of the several surrounding one-room schoolhouses that were closed when Duntroon Central opened in 1964. With each call, a flock of hands were raised. Regardless of the fate of Duntroon Central, it was clear that this remains a community that deeply cares about its educational institutions.
That sentiment was confirmed by Caroline Smith, the Simcoe County District School Board trustee for Collingwood, who upon being introduced was applauded for her efforts to try to save the school from closure during the Accommodation Review Committee process last year.
“I’ve never worked with a group of people who were so focused on saving a school for all the right reasons,” said Smith, noting the special spirit in every Duntroon graduate’s heart, and expressing hope that the opportunity now exists to take some of that spirit and embed it elsewhere.
The loudest applause of the afternoon came when Mayor Ken Ferguson, a Duntroon graduate himself, took the podium (the fact that DCPS student Jared Young gave him a wrestling-style introduction didn’t hurt: “And now…. the Mayor… of Clearview Township…. Ken… Ferguuussssoooonnn!”).
“This is a very sad day for me,” said Ferguson. “Usually I’m cutting ribbons or kissing babies. I don’t close schools; that’s not on my agenda.”
The Mayor went on to praise the community he saw in the audience. “I see many memories out there,” he said. “This is my community – look at all that this school has produced.”
Also speaking during the official part of Saturday’s program was outgoing DCPS principal Bill Floyd, who said he felt blessed to be part of the Duntroon community, if only for a short time; SCDSB Area 5 superintendent Paul Sloan, who painted a picture of what the world was like in 1964; DCPS students Young, Scott Miller and Sadie Campbell, who spoke of the history of education in Duntroon; and School Council chairperson Robin Ardilla, who spearheaded the organization of Saturday’s Grand Finale celebration.
The afternoon did feel more like a celebration than a funeral, which is what Ardilla and her committee had hoped for. Following the speeches, guests filed out of the gym to see most of the student population of DCPS assembled in a circle, banging out a rhythm on drums of various sorts and sizes. With help from the drummers of Group Soume, the students increased the intensity of their drumming as a group of Duntroon graduates – one for each decade of the school’s existence – accompanied by several students with multi-generational ties to the school carried a netting full of green and white balloons into the centre of the circle. Just as it seemed the music could not get any more raucous, it stopped dead and the balloons were released, floating up and over the village of Duntroon to the southeast and disappearing into the blue.
The rest of the day was taken up by a local talent show, a light barbecue dinner and a multi-generational baseball game.
Duntroon Central Public School will remain open until the last day of the 2011/2012 school year. When school gets underway again in September, its students will be divided between Nottawa Elementary School, Clearview Meadows Elementary School and Nottawasaga & Creemore Public School.