TORONTO -- The city's controversial Africentric school will open with twice the minimum number of students needed to justify its creation, a Toronto District School Board official said yesterday.

With 80 children signed up for Tuesday's opening, kindergarten and Grade 1 are full, said Lloyd McKell, executive officer for student and community equity.

The most controversial school in Canada has hit its latest speed bump: Should it hire its own principal, at almost $100,000 a year, or share one with the school that will host it?

With just weeks left to hire teachers, Toronto's planned Africentric alternative school is ready to hire a principal. But some critics are against spending the money.

Trustees will debate the issue tonight in private session, but the clock is ticking, warned trustee James Pasternak. The school will be located in his ward, in Sheppard Ave. Public School near Keele St.

"Look, we're piloting a very unique and creative curriculum and we need someone with the authority to run with it and make it work," said Pasternak, who believes hiring a principal to serve as the public face of the project will boost enrolment beyond the 70 children who have signed up for the program.

But trustee Josh Matlow called it "wrong to use tax dollars for a school of 40 to 70 students, regardless of whether it's Africentric. We're a school board facing a deficit of about $26 million."

Most of the board's 42 alternative schools are located in larger schools and share a principal with their host school.

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