Bluewater Board Says Keppel-Sarawak Library Will Stay, Adds Portable
Parents were informed earlier in the week that Keppel-Sarawak's fundraised library would become a classroom. The Bluewater board now says it will add a portable and leave it untouched.
The Bluewater District School Board says the library at Keppel-Sarawak Elementary School will not be altered this fall, following concern among parents who had been told the space would be converted into a classroom.
Keppel-Sarawak Elementary School sits on the boundary between the City of Owen Sound and the Township of Georgian Bluffs and, according to the school, serves about 480 students from junior kindergarten to Grade 6.
The school’s library was the subject of a community fundraising campaign in 2023. Local coverage at the time, including the Bluewater board's own newsroom, put the campaign's goal at $50,000 and documented a spring read-a-thon and a June Penny Carnival in support of it.
Parents now cite roughly $42,000 as the amount raised by the community for the library.
Where the concern started
Earlier this week, a teacher’s text message to parents and an anonymous post in a private parent Facebook group said the board had decided to convert part of the school library into a primary classroom for the 2026-2027 school year — using temporary wall dividers to split the room — rather than add another portable.
The posts urged parents to contact trustees. Neither communication came from the board.
A concerned parent contacted Owen Sound Current on Tuesday asking it to look into the matter.
“Our parent community at Keppel Sarawak school has been heartbroken today by the news that the library is to be partially eliminated for a temporary classroom,” the parent wrote.
The parent submitted a text message they said they had received from a teacher. It said the board had informed Keppel Sarawak teachers that the library space would be split in half with dividers and part of it repurposed as a classroom.
The text message urged parents to “use you voice to let the board office know we are not happy about this!”
In their email to Owen Sound Current, the parent added, “The hub (and heart) of our school is what it is because of a community fundraiser several years ago which raised $42,000. A teacher from the school has identified that the school board has opted for this solution over adding a seventh portable,” the parent added.
The library issue was not decided in either the board’s 2026-2027 budget report or the June 16 meeting at which trustees approved that budget, meaning no such decision came before trustees for a vote recently.
The board said it was still weighing options
In a message to families sent Wednesday through the school’s automated notification system, the school said neither principal Nicole Jackson-Hamilton nor anyone at the school level had information about a board decision, and that the concerns were being discussed at the board level with further communication to come.
In a separate email to a parent, the board’s chief executive officer, AJ Keene, wrote that staff were meeting with facilities and senior management to explore options and would communicate once that process was complete.
What changed Thursday: A portable, relocated from another school
On Thursday afternoon, Keene sent families a follow-up. He wrote that the board had secured a short-term solution — an additional portable, sourced from another Bluewater school, to be installed at Keppel-Sarawak this summer — and that the arrangement means the library “will not be changed in any way.”
Keene said adding newly leased portables is not a viable long-term answer, describing them as expensive, requiring long-term leases and significant site preparation, with several new schools opening in the coming years.
He said the board would examine longer-term measures to manage enrolment growth, including a review of how out-of-zone enrolment requests are handled, and that out-of-zone students already attending Keppel-Sarawak would keep their spots.
Jamie Pettit, responding for the board, told Owen Sound Current the developments ensure the library is unaffected in September and that the board would explore long-term solutions.
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