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w w w .i n si d eH A LT O N .c o m O A K V IL LE B EA V ER W ed ne sd ay , S ep te m be r 7, 2 01 1 4 school is built, this school will add an addi- tional high school grade each year to accom- modate the aging students. Its a great success because our first elementary school that is on Sedgewick Crescent actually has 230 students and fnow were serving 150. There are a lot o Francophones around, Maguire said. The new school has about 80 students in pre-Kindergarten to Grade 6, and another 65 in the older grades. We keep going up every day so its very encouraging, Maguire said. The other Oakville French public school has JK to Grade 6 classes. Up until now, the French students had to finish their educa- tion at the boards high school in Brampton. So the addition of a high school will be a welcome sight for some students in the area. The French school is not a French Immersion school, such as is available at the English-speaking public schools. The school operates entirely in French and in Grade 4 students get introduced to their first English class. Maguire said there are some advantages to sending children to such a school board over French Immersion. We keep up with the francophone or French culture. Thats very important for us. We offer the French culture and our identity as francophones also, she said. Also, our students who finish Grade 12, finish with a bilingual certificate. So when they go into the workforce, theyre fully bilingual. Its not just a basic in French lan- guage. Theyre just as fluent in French as they are in English so they could work as well in French as in English. It opens up doors for post-secondary school. Furthermore, because the students live in an English community, they get a full under- standing of the English language despite being in the French-language school. Maguire also hopes to spread the word to the community of the availability of the French school in town. Not all families know they can have French education so they tend to go to Immersion. So with opening the second school (in Oakville), we have families com- ing to us saying they didnt even know a total French school existed. French students introduced to English in Grade 4 Continued from page 1 ERIC RIEHL / OAKVILLE BEAVER FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL: ole - mentaire Oakville Est and ole secondaire Oakville teacher Marinda Rondeau, right, greets Aubrey Lynch as she gets off the bus.