Starter schools are a "good short-term fix" for enrollment pressures, says the chair of Edmonton's public school board, hoping the province will fund five of them for growing neighbourhoods in the city.

But Alberta Liberal Education critic Kent Hehr calls starter schools "trailer park schools," saying "putting a bunch of trailers in a field and calling it a school is clearly not what Albertans expect in one of the wealthiest jurisdictions in North America."

On Monday, Premier Jim Prentice announced $30.6 million in funding for four starter schools in Calgary as well as planning for a new high school and up to eight modular classrooms.

Joined by Infrastructure Minister Manmeet Bhullar and Education Minister Gordon Dirks, Prentice said the schools are permanent facilities that will be constructed in phases to meet enrollment pressures.

"These are essentially rapid-response classrooms that are made available to accommodate children more quickly than if we followed the traditional approach of constructing the entire school building first," explained Prentice, adding they would be completed "as further capital dollars are made available."

Starter schools are a a series of modular classrooms that are connected together with administrative space and an "activity space" such as a gym.

Dirks added that the schools would be "elastic," meaning they could be built out to allow for more students or be taken apart if the space is no longer needed.

"This is really only the beginning ... certainly, we're open to have the same discussion in Edmonton. The Calgary Board responded very quickly in terms of their priorities," said Prentice.

Edmonton Public School Board Chair Sarah Hoffman said it first started talking about the idea with Alberta Education back in June and in August, requested five K-3 starter schools for Haddow, The Hamptons, The Meadows, Summerside East and Windermere that can accommodate 250 students each.

"They're all new neighbourhoods where we're busing kids, some of them up to an hour which is of course, not ideal. We think that this could be a good short-term fix while schools are being built in those areas."

Hoffman was assured the schools would be "aesthetically pleasing."

She hopes the government will announce starter schools for Edmonton soon as the city needs over two dozen new schools and school modernization projects.

The Edmonton Catholic School Board has not discussed starter schools with the government. Chair Cindy Oleson said the board would welcome discussions as it is still waiting for 16 modular classrooms that were supposed to be delivered to help with overcrowding at the beginning of September.

Wildrose Education critic Bruce McAllister said the Calgary schools are "a drop in the bucket."

"The fact is we've ended up in this classroom crisis because this PC government has failed to build the schools Alberta needs, despite seemingly endless promises to do so," he said.

NDP Education critic Deron Blilous said the government has forced school boards to accept starter schools "that are basically modulars" and "this is an example of Tories throwing money at a problem that they created in the first place."

matthew.dykstra@sunmedia.ca

@SunMattDykstra