Sharing Our School’s Story:

Who Are We: Spul’u’kwuks is named from the Musqueam language meaning, “place of bubbling water,” where the land and water meet.  It is located in the northwest corner of Richmond, near a former permanent Musqueam fishing settlement going back thousands of years.  Spul'u'kwuks Elementary School was built in 2000 and opened in October that year.  Currently, we have grown to about 400 students.  Half of our students are English Language Learners (ELL).  We are the only school in Richmond that has a balanced calendar with three months in session followed by a one-month break.  Our breaks are in December, April and August. Our mascot is the eagle. 

Our Mission Statement: At Spul’u’kwuks we are a community of learners committed to developing a nurturing environment that encourages caring, respect, trust and personal growth.  We value diversity, believe in the importance of building relationships and honour the uniqueness of each individual.  We strive to create meaningful experiences that encourage a joy for learning.  We have inspirational words on the wall in our foyer: Create, Transform, Imagine, Explore, Discover and Wonder. 

Our School Goals: School Goals provide staff with a focus to develop collective efficacy.  They build on each other and a new one does not eliminate an old one.  

2022-2023

Last year, we increased the number of school-wide activities and reinforced the idea of kindness (to self, to others, and to our community) to work on building a sense of belonging and connectedness.  As we have been learning more about Truth and Reconciliation, and scanning in our classrooms, we noticed that not as many students as we believed understood the significance of our school’s name and its connection to the land upon which our school sits. We see a need to connect to our place to build our school identity and to continue to increase our student’s sense of belonging.

Focus Statement:

How do we build belonging through a school-wide inquiry of who we are as a school and as a community of learners?

Action Statement:

To build belonging, we will:

• educate ourselves on our place and our connections to our place and each other

• engage staff and students in activities designed to support teamwork and work toward a collective goal

• increase student voice

Evidence Statement:

We know that our work with students is making a difference when students can describe their sense of belonging and connectedness and can show how we work together.

Our Actions and Evidence Posts demonstrate student learning related to our focus. The Action posts are examples of ways students and staff are enhancing their learning related to our focus. The Evidence posts share the difference we are making in student learning related to our focus and guide our next steps.