By Galen Simmons
Students in associate professor Adrienne Johnson’s Intro to Sustainability course at Wilfrid Laurier University are helping to create a sustainable future for residents in the community of St. Agatha in Wilmot Township.
Similar to projects undertaken by students in the course in Wilmot Township communities over the past two years, the students in this year’s class have partnered with the township’s planning department to employ the sustainable-planning practices they’ve learned in class in a real-world setting.
“The idea came from another professor in our department, Robert McLeman,” Johnson said. “He did at least two previous iterations of the course – one in New Dundee previously and another one in Baden. He spent a few years creating this class and we were able to design this through a relationship we have with a former student who’s now in the Wilmot planning office.”
The course itself is offered by the department of geography and environmental studies and focuses on environmentally sustainable municipal planning. The goal of this project is to study the existing infrastructure, assets and issues facing residents in St. Agatha to create a future vision for the small, rural community with a population of just over 600 people that balances sustainable, controlled growth with the needs and wants of current residents.
On Jan. 31, despite the cold and snowy conditions, Johnson took her students on a walking tour of St. Agatha so they could see for themselves what the community has to offer.
“The students froze,” Johnson laughed, “and, actually, this ties into one of the challenges of St. Agatha; we didn’t have a place to sort of congregate and debrief after the walking tour I took them on. There’s a community centre, which we met at, that wasn’t open, and then there’s Kennedy’s. But (the students are) just sort of connecting this to some of the things that have been pointed out to us by our contact from the Wilmot planning office, and then also to sort of seeding ideas of, if students are envisioning the needs that the community may have, more community gathering spaces is one of them.”
Though a group of 35 students walking through the community may have been an odd sight for St. Agatha residents, they had the opportunity to look at and discuss potential uses for vacant buildings in St. Agatha like the old St. Agatha Catholic school and the Canadian Independent College, as well as underutilized outdoor spaces like St. Agatha Park.
“Students were able to see the potential,” Johnson said. “I think one of the things students are really looking at is how can we repurpose some of these spaces given these two (vacant buildings) do have septic systems. Obviously, St. Agatha doesn’t have a sewer system, so students are sort of thinking how can these sites be repurposed to enhance the quality of life for folks in the community. Some students are now interested in, given the population, perhaps … creating a senior-citizen community because there are these – I don’t know what they were, maybe they were dorms in the past or something like that – little housing buildings around the property.”
Following the walking tour, the class published an online survey on Feb. 10 in hopes of gaining better insight into what issues the community is facing and what they would like to see in the future. The survey is open until Feb. 24 and is available at https://tinyurl.com/4rzwjff3. Johnson was also back in St. Agatha earlier this week distributing flyers to make residents aware of both the planning project and the online survey.
After their planning research is finished, the students will be tasked with coming up with ideas for the future of St. Agatha whether that be the development of a seniors’ community, the repurposing of the old Catholic school, or even bringing back a community staple like the St. Agatha Strawberry Festival, which was last held in 2019. The students will be responsible for drafting a budget for their ideas and identifying available funding sources before they present their ideas to township planning staff and members of the community at Laurier towards the end of their course.
While the student reports won’t officially be commissioned by the township, they will be available to township staff and council as jumping-off points for future projects in St. Agatha.
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