With the Town of Okotoks pushing for the first of two proposed 900 student high schools to be built within the town limits instead of Aldersyde, the Foothills School Division is bringing their side of the story as to why the phase one school is still scheduled to be built in Aldersyde first in the Spring of 2016.

Division Superintendent John Bailey says the land at Aldersyde was confirmed long before the town had possession to any kind of land that could hold a school.

"The division had been told repeatedly there are no sites available in town," he says. "A year ago the town was telling us seven to twelve years before we get a site, last February-March they revised that to say it could be as early as three years in a 3-5 year window."

But after the town announced that they've conditionally obtained 40 acres of land north of town in August, Bailey said that announcement threw a curve ball at their high school plans.

"We looked at it and said we got two great sites available," he says. "One south of the Sheep River and one north of the Sheep River to high schools in, there's now secret that Okotoks is planning to grow, strategically long range to have a presence on both sides of the river makes sense."

Bailey adds that with the two sites for the proposed high schools creates a perfect situation to what's been an ongoing problem of max capacity at other high schools locally.

"We look at it as a win-win and I guess I think the town right now is trying to paint it as an either or," he says. "We don't want to look at it that way, we would be looking at two core high schools of about 900 students and hopefully expanding those overtime as Okotoks continues to grow.

Bailey adds that the ongoing concerns brought up on the Aldersyde site including the safety along the roadway to the proposed school is already in the works of making sure student safety is increased among the other concerns outline by the town's media release sent out on Tuesday.