Mackenzie Sends Letter to Min. of Education
Prince George, B.C.- B.C.’s Minister of Education has, by now, received a letter from the Mayor of Mackenzie asking that School District 57 be shifted to a ward system.
In the letter, Mackenzie Mayor Pat Crook requests ” a variation in the order of which School District 57 Trustees are to be elected.” Specifically, it calls for a ward system in which one trustee is elected in the Mackenzie area, one trustee elected in the Robson Valley and the remaining five Trustees be elected in Prince George.
The letter says more than 1000 of the students in School District 57 are attending classes outside the municipal boundary of Prince George.
According to the letter, of the 60 school districts in B.C., nearly half ( 28) “have provisions for geographic representation on their Board of Trustees.”
The letter isn’t the only action taken to back the request “We have over 500 signatures on a petition now” says Mayor Pat Crook . A petition supporting the request is also circulating in the Robson Valley and Crook says it has already collected more than a 100 signatures.
The issue has been simmering for more than a year . “There were concerns over costs” says Mayor Crook as there are concerns the School District’s Administration costs will have to increase to cover travel costs should a regional representation model be adopted “I don’t think that is a valid concern” says Crook, who says use of technology, such as Skype could reduce the added expense. “Not every meeting would be attended in person, I’m sure there is a skype system being used now. There will be more costs, but it won’t be coming out of the schools in Mackenzie, it will be coming out of the administration budget.”
With a Provincial election in the wind, Mayor Crook doesn’t know if there is enough time for the Minister of Education to act on the request before the writ is dropped and voters head to the polls. In the meantime, Mayor Crook will be making a presentation to the Board of Trustees for School District 57 on February 28th.
Comments
It’s rediculous and insulting for those communities that it ever got to this point. The province should do the right thing and force SD57 to go to a ward system.
What is ridiculous and insulting is that, during the election campaign, every elected member of the school board promised they would support Mackenzie and the Robson Valley having their own School Trustee. Once elected, they all changed their tune!
It has been said; the School Board is often used as a stepping stone for individuals advancing their “political careers”. Shirley Bond was a PG School Trustee / Chair, John Rustad was a PG School Trustee as well. In my opinion, the School Board seems to be a good starting point for junior politicians to practice making promises and then breaking them.
I guess you better add Carole James, former NDP leader to your list!
Yup, Carole James, NDP, a former school board trustee! In fact, Carole served as President of the B.C. School Trustees Association for an unprecedented five terms, commencing in 1995. She was elected to the Greater Victoria School Board from 1990 to 2001. She has also served at the national level as the vice-president of the Canadian School Boards Association.
With all of her School Trustee experience, she must be really good at making promises and then breaking them!
But we must at least give her credit for publicly stating that Glen Clark’s NDP BCTF “sweetheart deal” was unaffordable!
And, under HG’s unfocused guidance, this discussion thread just jumped from being about our school district, to some school district on Vancouver Island. I am sure there are other current and past provincial politicians that started out as school district trustees through-out the province, why don’t you do some research and get back to us on your results HG?
As for the rural communities asking for their own trustees, good on Mackenzie, Valemount, and McBride for asking for better representation. Many other school districts have already changed to the ward system, and in my opinion, it’s high time for Prince George to do the same!
See how I brought the discussion back on topic HG?
Another prime example of bh’s glaring Hippocracy©
On a story about the nomination of Bobby Deepak to PG riding he posted 22 of 88 comments none of which was relevant to the ndp nomination. Instead the regular whine and moan we have come to expect including personal attacks on the premier.Yawn.
250news.com/2017/02/14/ndp-announce-candidate-in-pg-mackenzie/
As for the story MacKenzie has their nose out of joint as the elementary school is running slightly over capacity. Unfortunately the current population does not support reopening the other school. It would be a waste of money to have two half full schools and I am sure the board took the number of pre-school kids into consideration.
Ward system or not the board made the right decision.
My goodness, these pro BC Liberals cannot seem to keep the discussion on topic, now we have an attempt by sparrow to divert the discussion towards me, and away from our school district’s method of determining it’s trustees. Flattered that sparrow should pick me a the subject of discussion but I insist we get back to the subject at hand.
Mackenzie’s interest is more that just being about whether a school is “slightly” over capacity, or if a school should be reopened or not! Given secondary course selection, some students are not able to take the academic courses “of their choice”. In smaller communities and schools, the majority of students would seek to enroll in foundations math, for example, leaving only a handful of students who wish to take pre-calculus.
In this example, pre-calculus would not be provided, because the number of students would not warrant the offer… too bad for those few students as in smaller communities and schools, the selection of courses are smaller than what would be offered in schools in Prince George. Reduced course choice and selection is just one example of how public education in smaller communities differs from the quality of public education offered in a larger center such as Prince George.
There are many other differences, that due to economies of scale, public education is in fact of “inferior” quality in smaller communities compared to large centers like Prince George. In other words; there are enough differences that these smaller communities deserve representation on the School Board so that their concerns, are guaranteed to at least be considered by the rest of the Board majority… or would it be more comfortable for everyone to keep these smaller communities minority voices silent?
Don’t flatter yourself the comment had nothing to do with anything but your unending Hippocracy©
Why is it surprising that a smaller community does not or cannot justify having the same course selection as a larger center. There are schools in the lower mainland thet offer courses that are not available in Prince George. There are alternatives for those who wish to take courses that are not offered in small towns.
Gawd! I suppose the next thing is that MacKenzie hospital and UHNBC for that matter want a heart transplant program because they have one in Vancouver.
Lacking the ability to empathize might be a Conservative thing I suppose, yet here we are, people living in Prince George complaining about how much the dominant lower mainland gets, yet at least we get two elected representatives (Shirley & Mike) to represent the rest of us up here in the hinterlands of BC.
All these small rural communities are asking for is the same thing that we have, representing us against a province dominated by the lower mainland, two elected people out of seven who can at least represent their concerns in a Prince George dominated school district.
It would be unfortunate that we in Prince George would constantly complain about nothing existing past Hope, when it comes to provincial matters, yet turn around and pretend the smaller communities in our School District not existing when it comes to matters of public education.
Bottom line; our Prince George School District includes the smaller communities of Mackenzie, Valemount, and McBride, lets give them a voice!
Lacking the ability to empathize might be a Conservative thing I suppose, yet here we are, people living in Prince George complaining about how much the dominant lower mainland gets, yet at least we get two elected representatives (Shirley & Mike) to represent the rest of us up here in the hinterlands of BC.
All these small rural communities are asking for is the same thing that we have, representing us against a province dominated by the lower mainland, two elected people out of seven who can at least represent their concerns in a Prince George dominated school district.
It would be unfortunate that we in Prince George would constantly complain about nothing existing past Hope, when it comes to provincial matters, yet turn around and pretend the smaller communities in our School District not existing when it comes to matters of public education.
Bottom line; our Prince George School District includes the smaller communities of Mackenzie, Valemount, and McBride, lets give them a voice!
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